


if we're going to be in solitude, let's do it together

by gaypasta



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fluff, Forced Isolation to Lovers, Isolation, M/M, Strangers to Lovers, They watch Dance Moms together Im not sure what else to say, Zoom calls, quarantine au, there's only one bed
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-16
Updated: 2020-05-16
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:21:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 24,359
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24208117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaypasta/pseuds/gaypasta
Summary: Stanley Uris, student accountant, gets given the keys to Bill and Mike's apartment empty when lockdown is announced. He basks in the solitude for some days, going about with some motion of normalcy, until a stranger, known as Richie Tozier, waltzes in, holding a key given to him by Mike.The two learn to coexist with clashing personalities in Mike and Bill's shitty one-bedroom apartment, they coexist and through disconnect from their friends, learn to make the best of the situation. I mean, it's better than being isolated on their own, right? Right??
Relationships: Bill Denbrough/Mike Hanlon, Richie Tozier/Stanley Uris
Comments: 6
Kudos: 33





	if we're going to be in solitude, let's do it together

**Author's Note:**

  * For [missvega](https://archiveofourown.org/users/missvega/gifts).



> For @starrystoziers on tumblr for the IT Fandom Exchange :) I swore I was never going to be that bitch to write a long, 20k oneshot but hi! Thats me! :)

Stan had been inside Bill and Mike’s apartment many times before. Countless times, in fact. It just so happened that Bill and Stan ended up both studying at New York State. They’d remained close all of their lives, and the thought of suddenly being uprooted from each other and carted off to Universities across the country from each other had been an uncomfortable thought. Moreso than leaving their families behind. Well, for Stan, anyway. In Bill’s case, he had punched Georgie (who was thirteen and completely indifferent to his brother’s whereabouts, whether be half a mile South in the Barrens, or some four-hundred miles away in New York) in the arm and scruffed up his hair with a lopsided grin, and then pulled the car over some ten minutes later as his crying grew so blubbered and distracting that he had to pass the driver’s side over to Stan.

It should be said that despite Stan and Bill going to college with their suitcases trying to violently mount each other in the trunk of Bill’s fourth-hand Pontiac, they didn’t actually make any effort to room together. They easily could have applied for off-campus housing, but if they did that, then it was likely that they would never make an effort to see anyone  _ but _ the other, and they would graduate without a list of college friends and enough blackmail on the other to make a nun feel feint. Stan ended up rooming with Ben Hanscom, an aspiring architect who was as considerable a roommate as Stan could have asked for. If, when drunk, Ben would bumble around and create skyscrapers of various items of their room, including but not limited to: an IKEA dresser, Ben’s laundry hamper, end tables, an upturned wastebasket and many, many books, Stan never mentioned it simply due to the fact that it was always perfectly clean again by the time he’d come back from class.

Ben quickly became a close friend to both him and Bill and when Beverly and Eddie came up to visit for New Years, it didn’t come to anyone’s surprise (except Ben’s) when Beverly pulled Ben into a kiss when the ball dropped. 

Bill’s roommate had been Mike Hanlon. A history major with a minor in Literature. Stan had been at University for a whopping three years now, and Mike remains the only History/Literature student that had been any which way bearable. More than bearable. Mike grew to be one of Stan’s best friends, even going to his and Bill’s off-campus apartment after they moved out of dorms in second-year to watch movies that weren’t on Bill’s radar. 

“How can it not be on your radar, Bill? You’re doing a minor in film studies.” Stan would ask every time Bill passed on movie night.

“It’s just not the type of stuff I’m into.” Bill would reply.

“He watched The Goonies three times back-to-back yesterday.” Mike would say, followed by Bill telling them both to eat a dick and going to his room to complete some study on some Shakespearean classic.

When Stan turned around on New Year’s Eve to go back to the bar for another beer, he found himself too far from the line of sobriety to feign any type of shock or surprise when he bumped into Mike and Bill making out at said bar, much to Bill’s mortification. It all worked out though, Bill bought him a beer in apology and Stan drank it while Bill made about his lengthy and truthfully quite touching soliloquy on how truly sorry he was that he hadn’t told Stan about him and Mike. Stan finished the drink and told him that he, nor any of their other friends, were fooled by their shoddy acting and he hoped he shoved cotton in the small of his cheeks when talking to his parents about his roommate as to not salivate all over the Denbrough dining table. Bill still insists Stan owes him that bottle of beer back. 

When the state was announced to be going into lockdown, Stan had weighed his options very, very seriously. Bill had planned to go back home, but upon hearing that his parents had converted his bedroom into his dad’s office (‘temporarily!’), he decided to go with Mike to his home some twenty miles outside Derry. Stan’s predicament was a little trickier. He still lived on-campus. He was an RA, so he got free board and his own room. The money he was saving was worth the occasional disruption in sleep from timid freshmen coming with emergencies. Stan must be in the most unlucky building in the world because apparently, a door-pummelling emergency happened at least twice a week. A solid ninety-per cent of these emergencies were re-diagnosed when he would lean into the personal space of some eighteen-year-old passed out on the floor and with an exaggerated sniff ask, “Is that tequila?” Then suddenly, it’s not actually that big of a deal, the poor guy’s blood sugar is probably just low, sorry for waking you up, good night. 

When the lockdown was announced and all the students made the way back home, they decided that the dorms had to be closed for decontamination. Stan insisted that his weekly cleaning routine was more than what these hazmat maids could accomplish in a month. His complaining got him nowhere and he was left with nowhere to go. His father had a tumour in his lung removed, it worked, but at the expense of 50% of his left lung’s gusto, so going home was out of the picture entirely. 

He sat on Bill’s couch as Mike packed the last of what they would need for the near and possibly distant future. Bill brought up the argument that it’s little more than the flu, and that it really wasn’t worth Stan worrying this much about going home. Mike pointed out that thousands of people die of the flu every year. Stan pointed out that Bill’s immune system was that of a malnourished Victorian boy suffering from acute tuberculosis and if  _ he _ caught it, would he prefer to be thrown over the edge of the Barrens, or would he rather be stuffed and kept in Georgie’s bedroom to make sure the kid doesn’t buy crack cocaine or something on the dark web. Bill, once again, told them both to suck a dick. Stan started to consider whether or not Bill is trying to initiate a threeway. 

Some twenty minutes later, when Mike was waiting patiently in the car for Bill and Stan to finish up, Bill gave Stan his key and said: “Here - you c-can stay here.” 

“For how long?” 

“As long as my plants need watering.” He didn’t have any houseplants. Stan gave Bill a sincere smile and genuinely wished them both a safe journey in between his uncontrollable ‘thank-you’s and ‘you’re the best’s. 

With a little help from an Uber driver who went well beyond his five-star rating, and a handful of hours, Stan had completely moved out of his dorm and rerouted all of his belongings to Bill and Mike’s apartment on the fifth floor. Stan begrudged the part of him that insisted on reading hardcovers some point around the third flight. He gave Lois a twenty-dollar tip. 

It was a little odd, he thought. You see, it felt wrong to leave his things in their boxes. It made him feel like some type of homeless vagrant, taking advantage of a free house. Like any moment Bill and Mike would come back and he would have to make a quick getaway with a box of hardbacks, three boxes of clothes, and a box of anti-nausea tablets and painkillers. The latter being the reason for him being the student body’s favourite RA after Freshers. On the other hand, it felt weird to unpack all of his knick-knacks and place them amongst Bill and Mike’s, like some perverted stalker who broke into their house and is living out his delusional fantasy by unpacking his books and placing H. Brownley’s  _ Maine’s Great Tits _ amongst Bill and Mike’s classic literature, or unpacking his pills and putting them amongst whatever they have stuffed in their medicine cabinet. Knowing how Bill’s colds tend to outlast the seasons from lack of care, probably a family of moths and little else. 

After some hours of unpacking items, putting them out, then feeling like a foster child desperately trying to force himself into the family of two loving gay dads, he tore at his hair and decided to leave them in their boxes for now. He did, however, unpacked his clothes and made use of the empty closet space in their bedroom after texting Bill to ask if it was alright. 

_ 16:02 _ _   
_ _ Hey, is it ok if I hang my clothes up in your closet? If I leave them in the boxes they’d get that dusty smell. _

_ 16:02 _ _   
_ _ smelly stan the dust man _ _   
_ _ yeah thats ok. How are my house plants _

_ 16:03 _ _   
_ _ Thanks _ _   
_ _ You don’t have any _

_ 16:03 _ _   
_ _ Fire escape _

_ 16:14 _ _   
_ _ What is that?! _

_ 16:14 _ _   
_ _ It was in the refirdgerator when we moved in lol _ _   
_ _ feed me seymour  _

__ Stan locked the fire escape in the chance that whatever furry monster Bill had scooped out of the refrigerator had evolved enough to actually become sentient, and immediately checked the refrigerator for leftover toxic waste. Nothing.

Like, literally nothing. He expected better from Mike, but with the amount of studying and extra-curricular Mike does, he supposes even the best of them fall to a diet of instant ramen and cereal-for-dinner eventually. Stan at least got a handful of slightly bruised fruits a couple of times a week hanging from his doorknob in a paper bag. He was called by a first-year med student practising taking blood on herself who had accidentally punctured her femoral artery. Stan  _ should _ have brought her to a hospital, reported her for stealing lab supplies, harming herself, and for thinking that an appropriate place to take blood would be in the  _ leg _ . She would have gotten kicked out of medicine for that. Instead, he took her two floors up and to the door of an equally incompetent and sticky-fingered third-year med student who sewed her up with all the gentleness of a man tying his shoes before stepping into a puddle of flesh-eating fireants. They started dating three weeks later. Stan reckoned that granting her a foile a duex of future gross medical malpractice warrants perhaps non-bruised fruits. This bruised fruit made up for his breakfast and lunch most days. 

Stan resigned a sigh, stared longingly at the bowl of shrivelled kiwis, and reluctantly put through an online order at the supermarket. In the comments section, Stan considered requesting bruised fruit, then the image of a teenager using his melon as a punching bag prompted him against it. 

The fruit arrived bruised anyway. Which wouldn’t have been an issue if not for the fact his melon had been subbed out for the closest thing available, which in someone’s head apparently, was a punnet of raspberries. Stan would never study psychology given the fact that he is going to college to get a job to go along with the shiny degree, but he begins to understand why people do it as he pulls out a mint plant - his replacement for toothpaste. He would like to study the brain of whoever did his grocery shopping. Which, according to the cheery signature at the bottom of the list, was ‘Gary’.

It had been two days since he had ‘moved in’. Stan was an introvert at the best of times, he supposed. He didn’t really believe in the notion of introversion and extroversion, but he enjoyed and thrived in his alone time. It being the main reason he kindly rejected Ben’s offer of moving in together at the end of their first year. He had been a little moruse about Stan’s answer, Stan knew Ben was an only child and he knew he didn’t have many friends growing up, so he was probably excited at the prospect of hanging out with someone his own age. Stan visited Ben at least three times a week to make up for it, but even at that, they rarely  _ did _ anything. Stan liked being left to his own devices, but it didn’t necessarily mean he liked being alone for it. They would get food and then work in quiet, occasionally complaining about an assignment or bouncing ideas off one another. 

This was not the same. 

The last person Stan had seen was this morning when he was opening the window on the fire escape (with a nervous glance to Audrey III) and from the apartment below, another student, leaned out of their window and screamed with such raw emotion that Stan’s throat hurt just  _ hearing  _ it, then promptly shut their window. He’s just glad it didn’t awaken the furry monster beside him, a title normally reserved for Ben. 

Stan was under the impression that during this lockdown he would transform into some uninhibited scholar, he would excel at all his studies and get assignment after assignment handed in in record time. That, tragically, could not have been further from the truth. His own presence bounced around the walls of the apartment until the room was stuffy with his own solitude and it became all he could think about. It demanded his attention with as much subtlety as a brick through a windshield. He found that despite the lax environments of online lectures, the extension on assignments and the unwritten agreement that the grading would be adjusted to the deflation of the priority of education in these times, he felt more overwhelmed with work than ever. All his thoughts were clogging up the drain in the bathroom sink and he’s not a plumber. How many people does it take to unclog a sink? More than one, apparently. The more Stan tries the more it clogs, the water is coating his arms and splashing over his feet. 

The thought of spending another six weeks with his hands fishing in a sink drain is enough to slam his laptop shut and massage his temples. He grabs his phone from the space on the couch beside him and scrolls through Instagram. A photo of Bill proudly holding a chicken in the air uploaded by Mike. Stan feels the urge to be there with his friends. He thought his solitude was something he sought comfort in, when in reality it was something he used strategically, getting work done as quickly as possible so he has more free time to go watch movies with Mike, or go exploring down the streets of New York with Bill, or even accompanying Ben on his runs. Ben was always conveniently sore or tired on the days Stan joined him, keeping him at Stan’s pace. 

This solitude was not in preparation for anything at all, it was a foreign, nonlinear space that Stan had never explored before. It had no goal, no end in sight. Stan scrolled to the next picture. The following three pictures were blurry photos of Bill dropping, then being chased by the chicken. Stan laughed and spared a like. He was filled with an uncomfortable mix of jealously at their closeness, but a joy at that, too. 

Stan decided to get up and make some dinner. He made chicken. He took a picture of it to send to Bill but deleted it at the last second. He ate his dinner leaning out the window. Hopefully, Audrey II didn’t smell it and try to eat him for it. 

On the third day of solitude, Stan had taken to rereading the bird book his dad had gotten him for his eleventh birthday. It was well-worn, mud-stained, and at places, barely legible. It was his favourite book of all time. When he was little and he and Bill would go exploring, he would use it as a shield, as if any monsters would see a pocket bird-watcher’s manual and decide ‘yeah, it’s not worth it, I’m never gonna get through that.’ When in reality, if these monsters were to try him, it would be more of a ‘oh, this kid is desperate. It’s kind of sad. Let’s just leave him.’ If it works, it works though, right? 

It was a breezy morning, and there was a definite wind chill. Stan kept Audrey III’s window open, it was a small comfort to hear the murmurings of gentle traffic and the smells from others’ kitchens, a reminder that yes, it’s lonely, but everyone is lonely together. The sun’s warmth swaddles the bite of the cold, its encapsulation embrace is worth the cold on his bare arms. His sweater laid untouched on the coffee table. He had an online lecture this morning, it started half an hour ago but Stan couldn’t bring himself to muster the energy to care about accountancy right now. Whatever he missed, he was sure that he could catch up. The sinking feeling swirled in his gut, ‘Unless you feel this way forever’. But that won’t happen. It can’t happen. 

Stan scrubbed at his eyes. A headache was coming on, he could feel it building behind his eyes. It could be from anything. Stress, reading too much, or caffeine withdrawals. Yesterday, on his third cup of morning coffee and feeling no better for it, he realised the psychological mystery - Gary - had subbed his coffee for decaf. It would have been more suitable to have swapped his coffee for a bottle of lemon juice - at least he could squirt that in his eyes to wake himself up. Drinking decaf coffee in the morning is about as effective as running a marathon in ice skates. In fact, less so. You’d get some notoriety for style in the attempt.

Hoping the placebo effect will override the grocer’s incompetence, Stan made his way into the tiny kitchenette and began making his coffee. Navigating the space the past three days had granted him some level of empathy for Bill and Mike’s poor diet, the kitchen was so small that the first time Stan swung the refrigerator door open, it slammed against the counter opposite. The oven could be opened the full way, with less than a foot to spare. He dropped a knife when chopping onions last evening and it ricocheted off of the cabinet opposite him, onto the cabinet beside him, then onto his foot. He tried to imagine Mike, who was built broad, trying to work his way around the kitchen with Bill cramped up beside him. The images took a frightful unexpected turn and Stan made a face to himself as he shook the images away. 

The mug he was drinking out of was actually one of his own. He had bought a pair of mugs when he lived in the dorms, one for him and one for Ben, when he noticed the rings of stains inside the mugs provided in the common area. Sure, he  _ could _ wash them before using them, but the thought of drinking out of a communal mug was offensive. The mugs were the first ones he saw in the store, he didn’t even look before buying them, which then sent Ben into hysterics at the pair of mugs.  _ ‘Spill the Liber-tea’ _ and  _ ‘Ask Me About My Hole-Food Diet’ _ with a picture of a bagel. Stan stared at the mugs, dismayed.

“I spent fifteen dollars on these.” 

“It was worth it,” Ben said. 

The coffee tasted better out of the Liber-tea mug. It was a proven fact, where he and Ben would take turns to have the ‘good’ mug. Ben said it was probably to do with the colour, black being a better insulator than white. Stan said it was because the coffee was prudent at being put in a mug with a tea pun printed on it that it overcompensated. They never reached an agreement on the matter.

Stan barely managed half a mouthful when he heard a noise. 

At first, he thought it could be the mailman. It’s probably mail-time, right? Stan wasn’t sure what time Bill’s mailman came. He relaxed against the counter, taking another half mouthful. The sounds continued. For way longer than it takes to shove mail under the door. Wait, doesn’t the mail all get put in the boxes downstairs? Just as Stan crossed the threshold from the kitchenette into the main space where the living room, Audrey III’s bedroom and the door to the outside world coexisted, the locked door swung open. 

When Mike said that he and his boyfriend were picking up and skedaddling out of the city in the midst of the whole ‘lockdown’ thing, it was only natural that Richie would bat his eyelids and ask oh-so-politely if he could do the honours of house-sitting. New York is dangerous, you know, people steal stuff all the time, and he’s sure that Mike would never be able to forgive himself if his vintage 1930’s edition of  _ Hamlet  _ got swiped. Mike had just rolled his eyes, slipped him his key and told him not to burn the place down. 

“If I do, believe me I will die valiantly protecting your prized hunks of paper.”

“Protecting?”

“Throwing them out of the window into the arms of a bystander with a hero complex, who is, in this scene, crying dramatically and telling me to leave the books, it’s not worth it, but following my orders to catch your books as I fling them out from the fire escape because deep down, they know it will be the last thing I do, and they honour that.” 

“Could you at least die in the hallway? It’ll be hard to resell the place if we have to disclose you got cremated on the window ledge.” 

“No can-do, Mikey.” 

Richie was effectively forced out of his apartment when his roommate said that lockdown wasn’t going to stop him living his life, and went down to Miami for Spring Break. Richie’s lungs are struggling with his pack-a-day habit, he doesn’t think those guys would be able to handle the big no-no virus. He begged his roommate not to go, he tried everything from bargaining, blackmail, education, he even drew diagrams. No dice. His roommate is due back from his petri dish today, and the poor fucker is going to have to learn how to scrub the skid marks from his tighty whities all on his own. 

What Mike, his dear-beloved childhood friend, failed to mention, was that apparently him and Sir William were playing AirBnB and letting any old fool waltz into the joint and make themselves at home. The man stared at Richie, mouth agape and with an expression of polite fear. You know the look, when someone knocks on your front door and it’s not:   
A: The Mailman   
B: Uber Eats   
Or C: One of your many, many beautiful girlfriends   
And it’s like, who the fuck are you? Likelihood is that it’s just some guy, looking to ask you directions to check the meter or whatever, but come  _ on. _ It’s not the 80’s - you don’t just go around knocking on people’s doors unless you’re some type of twisted psychopath. But of course, you can’t  _ say  _ that, so you smile awkwardly and defensively enough to say ‘hey - I don’t know who you are and you are not welcome here. But yes, I will fill in a neighbourhood survey if you ask.’

Now imagine that scenario, but you’re in your pajamas, and some guy didn’t knock on the door - he unlocked it and kicked it open with his foot and waltzed in like he owns the place. 

Now imagine you’re the guy who walked in, you’re staying at a friend’s place and he gives you his key, and you go in, and some guy is standing there drinking coffee as if  _ he _ owns the place. 

Richie dropped his bag to the floor. “Who the hell are you?” 

The awkwardly polite defensive smile turned to an awkwardly impolite defensive smile. “Who the hell are  _ you?  _ Are you breaking in to steal stuff?” 

“Yeah, I broke in with a  _ key, _ Sherlock.” 

The man shifted uncomfortably, he noticed how his eyes kept flicking down to Richie’s bag. Richie stayed lingering in the doorway, feeling vulnerable with his back open to the hallway. He imagined a cloud of germs engulfing him like he was in Osmosis Jones. A glance behind him informed him that the only cloud engulfing him would be the cloud of the apartment next door's hotboxing session. “I’m a friend of Mikey’s. He gave me his key-” Richie flashed it for flair, “-so I can stay here for a while until this entire  _ thing _ blows over.” 

“Oh. Oh - well I’m a friend of Bill’s. He gave me his key so I could stay here until this blows over.” 

Wild-West style, they stood staring at each other, respective keys in hand, ‘this apartment ain’t big enough for the two of us’. Until the man in his pyjamas realised this is a two-bedroom, so I  _ guess _ it is big enough for the two of them. The defensiveness dropped from his face and although his eyebrows didn’t relax, he opened the door and nodded Richie in. Richie picked up his bag and the man shifted onto his toes to peer over Richie’s shoulders. 

“I don’t have any other bags.”

“Oh-” The man looked sheepish being caught out for looking, “I just figured that you would’ve packed more, if you’ll be staying here and all…”

Richie stepped in through the doorway and the other man closed the door behind him. Richie had been in this apartment many times before with Mike and Bill, played video games with Bill on the couch with Mike nestled in the oversized beanbag ($10 at Goodwill) reading some snoozefest medieval texts or something but the space had never seemed as small as it did now. He dropped his bag onto the coffee table and unzipped it, pulling out his laptop and charging cable. He noticed Bill’s friend trying to look without being noticed, but these glasses aren’t for decoration or to cover Richie’s devilishly good looks.

“You think I underpacked.” Richie said.

“Uh - no. No, of course not.” Bill’s friend lied.

“Maybe  _ you  _ overpacked.” 

The man looked momentarily offended before he decided against saying whatever words were forming in his mouth, either deciding that Richie was right or that an argument wasn’t worth the time, effort, or the downfall of a relationship which seemed to progress to ‘moving in together’ before the more mundane what’s-your-names and how-are-yous. 

The man excused himself silently to the kitchenette and Richie respected the notion that the kitchenette provided an illusion of privacy, despite there being only an archway between the two spaces. The archway took up more of the kitchen than the actual kitchen did. Now somewhat alone, Richie zipped up the contents of his bag, clothes and some basic toiletries, and powered on his laptop. The outside world may have slowed to a standstill, but the online world was busier than ever, and since Richie had only ever worked from home, he couldn’t even make an excuse to not keep up with the deadlines looming over him.

After some minutes, and some noise, the man came back with a newly steaming cup of coffee. He seemed wary of Richie sitting on the couch and he seemed to gear towards the beanbag before deciding to hover near the coffee table like some kind of suicide’s ghost. Richie met his eyes and they both shared a tight lip smile. Then again. And again. And Richie had rewritten the same sentence three times when he angled his laptop almost-closed and tapped the top of it. 

“So… I’m Richie, but I’m sure you already know that,” Richie said. 

“Why would I know that?” The man said. Richie gave a short, awkward laugh.

“Well, obviously Mike has talked about me. Right?” The other man took a long sip of his coffee. “Bullshit he hasn’t! We grew up together.” Still sipping. “Well, obviously you don’t talk to Mike much, I mean, you’re friends with Bill.”

“Mike and I are close.” Richie doubted it. “We are. We watch movies together. We go to Central Park. We go to old bookstores to look for books for his Literary Dissertation.” 

Richie screwed up his face. “I forgot that Mike got boring.” 

“I don’t think he’s very boring.”

Richie considered the man’s matching blue pinstripe pyjamas and the copy of  a birdwatching pocketbook open face-down on the coffee table. “Yeah - I’d believe that.” 

“I’m Stanley. My friends call me Stan. I’ll be upstairs if you need me,” Stan said suddenly. He lifted the book off of the coffee table as he walked around it. 

It was sudden enough for Richie’s motormouth to stall a couple of times before he managed to say anything. When he did, Stan was already halfway up the stairs. “Sure thing, see you around, Stan,” He said.

“Stanley.” That was the last he heard of Stanley for several hours.

The only thing that reminded Richie that he wasn’t alone in the apartment was the occasional groaning of footsteps above him, and at one point, a short, muffled conversation. On the phone, probably. Richie had been tempted himself to call Mike and ask him, sincerly, what the fuck, man? But he had too much work to do. His boss was looking three satirical articles submitted to him by the end of the day. He requested that two of these be related to COVID-19, which is all well and good, because of course it will get traffic, but it lands Richie into a very awkward tightrope. He can’t write it  _ too _ satriarchial or the ‘journalism’ company will get heat for being unsympathetic or making light of people’s deaths, which is totally unsuitable, unless they die doing something funny, like fucking a toaster. But Richie’s already written two articles on penis-related deaths this year. Write it without enough satire and some management of middle-aged-women will share it thinking that yes, rubbing raw onion in your children’s eyes  _ will _ protect them from the virus. All-in-all, it was a journalistic nightmare. So much so that as the hours ticked on and on, Richie hadn’t even thought about making himself something to eat or fetching himself a drink, too focused on trying to write really funny, relatable words that make people Ha!Ha! out loud.

Rubbing his eyes under his glasses, Richie settled into the couch and continued to work, listening for sounds of life from the open fire-escape window.

Stan was pacing around Bill and Mike’s bedroom, Bill finally picked up on the sixth ring.

_ “Hello?” _

“Bill, what the hell.”

_ “What have I d-d-d-done?” _

“You didn’t tell me that someone else was staying here!”

_ “....huh?” _

“For god’s sake - Bill! Someone else is here. Richie, I think.”

_ “Uh… I don’t - [muffled speech] - you did? [distantly] Oh shit, I gave mine to Stan.…. I’m not telling him - you t-t-tell him!” _

After some shuffling noises, Mike’s voice came through. 

_ “Hi, Stan.” _

“Mike-”

_ “Okay, so I didn’t know Bill gave you the key before we left, if he had told me I would have given you a warning, so I’m sorry about that. [muffled talking] Yes, I’ll tell him, Bill. I’m getting there. I didn’t tell Bill that I gave my key to Richie, so he didn’t know either.”  _

“So you just… give your keys away to random people without discussing it first?”

_ “Not usually, no. Richie is an old friend of mine, we went to school together.”  _

“So he says.”

_ “Ah, you’ve spoken to him?” _

“That’s being generous. We shared names and then I came upstairs to very kindly ask Bill why there is a stranger with stained sweatpants standing in the apartment.”

_ “You really needn’t worry, Stan. Trust me, he’s a good guy. He’s just a little….” _

“A little…?”

_ “He is a… personality.”  _

“Oh my god,” Stan groaned, “He’s insufferable, isn’t he?”

_ “There's a reason that  _ you  _ never m-m-met him,”  _ Bill said.

_ “Bill-” _

“That  _ I _ haven’t met him? What does that mean?” 

“ _ Nothing - Bill’s just excitable today. _ ”

“Right.”

_ “He’s a good guy. He might just take a small adjustment period for you to get used to. And he might take a …. An adjustment period to get used to you. But he is a genuine friend that I have a lot of time and affection for, and I’d hold some hope that you take that as something.” _

“Okay… but if he stabs me in my sleep, my death is on your conscience.” 

“ _ Why is everyone threatening to die in my apartment… anyway. It’ll be fine, Stan. I’ll text Richie and fill him in on what happened. At least you’re not going to be isolated on your own.” _

_ “ _ Yeah, small victories,” Stan said. Inwardly, he thanked Mike for texting Richie on his behalf so that Stan wouldn’t have to go downstairs and hold the conversation himself. It’s not that Stan was particularly bad in social situations, the opposite, in fact. He breezed through parties and interviews and all sorts and his golden tongue awarded him with a lengthy list of connections in a wide variety of fields come his graduation. What he was  _ not _ good at, however, was connecting with people in his ‘downtime’. When the masks were taken off, and well-pressed shirts replaced with baggy house-clothes or pyjamas. A long list of people have known Stan, known his mannerisms and how he liked his coffee, how he organised his school notes and what particular music he liked to listen to, but only so few knew what socks he wore, what he listened to in the shower, what he raided the refrigerator for at midnight.  _ That _ type of knowledge was private, only displayed for his family, his friends. Suddenly, Richie knows he wears no socks at all to walk around the house. 

_ “I’ll talk to you later Stan, me and Bill are kind of… in the middle of something, but don’t hesitate to call if you need anything.”  _

“In the middle of - oh you two are revolting. I hate you both.” Stan ended the call as a pair of voices piped up giggling. 

Sometime later, after deciding to spend this awkward time getting some work done, his stomach began to pang in hunger. Time had got away from him, it was bordering dinner time and he had hardly eaten. Disgruntled about his break in routine, Stan blamed the man downstairs for disrupting him enough to wreak havoc on his mealtimes. 

Stan went downstairs (after putting on some more respectable clothes) to make food. He was thinking some cajun rice, thankfully Gary didn’t mess up his order enough to leave him without any real food. Even if all goes south, Bill and Mike came fortified with years worth of oatmeal, for some reason. Stan, who has spent many mornings in the Denbrough home in his formative years, and spent a fair few hangovers in the Denbrough-Hanlon apartment, has never once seen either of them eat oatmeal. He thinks of reasons why this might be, maybe one of them won a competition? A life’s supply of oatmeal? Maybe Mike saw them on sale and just threw them all into the cart? His very interesting train of thought was interrupted when he came through into the living space, and he was met with Richie, still on the couch. He lost his train of thought. 

It looked like he had hardly moved an inch and he was typing away, the sound of the tap-tap-tapping a strange sound but, reluctantly, welcome. Stan cleared his throat and Richie turned his head in surprise. 

“I’m making food. Have you eaten?” Stan said.

“Nah,” Richie said with a wave of his hand, “I’m working on stuff. I’ll probably just order some Chinese food later.” 

“Okay.” 

“I can order something for you? What do you like? You look like a vegetable chow mein guy. Am I right?” Richie said, “I bet I’m right.”

“Uh…” Stan said stupidly. He  _ was _ right. Was it his clothes? What made a guy look like he liked vegetable chow mein and more importantly, is it a good thing? “No, I’m making food. That’s why I asked if you were hungry.”

“Oh, you’re asking if I’ve eaten …. To offer me some?” 

“Yes?” This conversation seemed more difficult than necessary. 

“Oh - uh, yeah. Yeah, sure.” Richie said, looking somewhat embarrassed. He probably realised the conversation was as difficult as Stan did. “Thanks.” 

Richie, thankfully, doesn’t offer to help Stan in the kitchen. If he did offer, Stan couldn’t really give a polite way to say no. Maybe Richie was haunted by the awkwardness of the encounter and like Stan, didn’t particularly fancy extending it. Or maybe Richie knows that there is no way that both of them could work together in the kitchen. With the size of it, sharing a  _ bed  _ would be less intimate. Besides, the doorway is narrow and Richie is… broad. Wide. At the shoulders. He’d get wedged. 

The food doesn’t take long, and he brings both bowls of rice, two glasses of water, and his phone into the living space. Perks of restaurant experience is you never have to take multiple trips. One of the very, very few perks. Richie looks surprised when his food is set in front of him. Did he think Stan was lying? Or maybe he had never been made food before and hadn’t pieced it all together. 

“Thanks, this looks good,” Richie said. He closed his laptop and pushed it onto the space beside him, taking the bowl onto his lap. “Do I pay you or something?”

“Pay me?” 

“For the ingredients.” He was only half joking.

“Oh. I don’t know,” Stan said, considering this for a moment, “No?” 

“So it’s like… it’s like charity?”

“What? No. It’s just… food.” Richie gave him a look over his glasses. There was rice stuck to his lips. “I’m being kind.” 

“Is that the type of person you are? Kind?” 

Stan hadn’t moved from the opposite side of the coffee table. That was a strange question. This was a strange person. This is an extremely strange situation. How do you respond to that? Really, what type of response would fit the question in this context. Stan couldn’t think of any, so he shrugged and said, “I’m the type of person to put rat poison in my roommate's dinner.” 

Richie took a spoonful of the food and smiled. 

Stan, having truthfully, missed eating with people, sat down on the chair beside him and began eating. The conversation hadn’t lapsed a minute when Richie, with a mouthful of food asked what Stan did. The silence extended for a moment while Stan swallowed his food before responding. “I’m a student.”

“No shit.” Richie said sarcastically. 

“Accounting.”

“Oh wow. Now that - that is boring. I thought Mike’s classes were a total snoozefest, but accounting? What are you, fifty?” It was nothing that Eddie hadn’t said to him a million times, which Stan always thought was ironic, considering Eddie was in technical college for mechanics, something which Stan has to force his eyes open when listening to the details. 

“Yeah, it is boring.” 

“Why do it then?” Richie asked. 

“What do  _ you _ do?” 

“Uh...” Richie took several spoons of the rice while contemplating his response. Stan continued eating his dinner patiently. “I write articles for online satire websites. Like funny fake-news. It’s as satisfying as it sounds.” 

“Based on real current events?”

“Yeah, sometimes.” 

“So you’re like…” Stan looked for the words. “A creative journalist specialising in niche comedy?” 

“Oh man,” Richie grinned, “I’m stealing that for my resume.”

“Why do you do it?” 

“I want to get into comedy writing. Not sure what specifically yet, though. Sketches and SNL-type stuff interests me, but I don’t want someone breathing over my shoulder, you know? Nine times out of ten, their breath stinks.” 

“See, accounting is boring but it pays well-” Richie gave him a look, Stan gave a warning look back. “It pays really well. I don’t get the emphasis on people being pushed to make a career out of what they love, or what they’re passionate about. I’d rather do what I love because I want to, not because I need to pay the bills. I don’t want to rely on my hobbies to put food on the table because then I don’t do them for fun. Play becomes work and all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.” 

Richie nodded, thinking. “I get it. I understand. We’re on the same ocean, but different boats, let me hit you with this. I’m about to blow your mind.” Richie drum-rolled on the coffee table. “There’s a half-way point! Look at what I’m doing: journalistic comedy or whatever you said. I don’t care for journalism because, news to me, they don’t give you a fedora with a little bit of paper sticking in the rim and a flippy notebook. What they  _ do _ give you is tight deadlines and rejected content after rejected content. But I like comedy. I like playing around with sketches, stand-up, screenplays, that kind of thing. It’s a half-way point.” 

“But you just said you didn’t like it. Your job, I mean.”

“I-okay. Yeah. It’s a work in progress,  _ Stanley. _ ” Stan made a choice to ignore the delivery of his name and the face Richie pulled.

“How long have you been working there?”

“Since I was sixteen, technically.” Richie scratched his chin with the spoon. “I’ve been an employee of theirs for about a year but I’ve been a paid contributor since I was sixteen.” 

“When I was sixteen I was working in a Salvation Army.” Stan said. 

“You really get off on charity, don’t you?” 

“Shut up.” Richie looked devilish. “Technically yes. I mean, I didn’t get paid but my parents insisted that if I couldn’t find a job, I had to do something to bulk up my resume. It looks good on college applications. I did get first dibs on everything that was donated.” Richie leaned forward in interest. “Someone donated a limited edition print of one of the Harry Potter books. It sold on eBay for six-hundred dollars.” 

“How much did you buy it for?”

Stan smiled. “Two bucks.” Richie slapped his knee.

“Good golly-gosh Batman! I think I’m in the wrong career.” 

“You’re probably just overworked or… ‘under-creative’ is what Bill says sometimes. I think it means that… In his classes, they have specific parameters that their projects have to follow. There are limits on what they can and can’t do and it narrows his creativity. I guess he feels like he’s trying to run a marathon in a garage. Then he gets frustrated and sulks around the house for a couple of days, realises his deadline is creeping up on him and then he cranks something half-hearted in the space of three days and enough coffee to kill a bull moose.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Richie said. The conversation drifts after that. They bounce back to the space of small-talk. Favourite films (Richie’s is American Pie). Favourite artists (The Romantics). Favourite cartoon (Recess). All very safe, all very boring. Eventually, the food is finished and the dishes are washed. Richie offered but knowing that he wouldn’t wash them as well as Stan could, Stan declined the offer. Stan retreated upstairs with a wave and a quick, “I’m going to finish off some work. I’ll be in Bill and Mike’s room if you need me.” 

Richie waved him away with a quick thumbs up and the sound of his laptop fans whirring up again. 

\--

Time passed as time, the big traitor, tends to pass. The warmness blessed by the sun cooled with the evening breeze. The light fell from the window and the room grew thick with darkness. The noises from cars on the street and music from neighbouring apartments grew quiet. Even his own body betrayed him: his eyes grew tired and heavy, pained from the harsh light of his laptop screen; his joints grew stiff and his back had a dull ache from his sedentary workday; even his wrists had twinges of pain from the motion of typing at his laptop for the better part of an entire day. 

Richie sent the articles to his boss in a grossly unprofessional email, and received an equally casual confirmation that the email, had in fact, reached his boss ‘in terrible health. Use lube next time you fuck me with a workload and timeframe like this’. He closed his laptop and jumped off the couch, stretching his arms far above his head and stretching his back. It made disgusting popping noises that made Richie smile in the relief it gave him. 

He needed a shower. He didn’t smell or anything, but a long day’s work is always punctuated by a shower. You wash away the stress and let the headache melt into the drain. Richie kicked aside some of the soda cans he’d been drinking from and made way upstairs, having to hunch over a little as not to hit his head on the laughably low ceiling. Now, Richie isn’t short by any means. Richie clears maybe 6’1 on an average day but Mike is an inch taller, which is just unfair. See, Mike had always been taller than Richie, all through childhood. Even when Richie grew six inches in a year (with the stretch marks to prove it) Mike seemed to breezily match his pace - and then some. Then, another kick in the teeth, Richie’s roommate was taller than him too. Absolutely infuriating. Richie decides he hates Mike for these crimes he has committed. 

To top it all off, Richie had fooled around now and again but Mike was in love. In love and living together. With a guy who couldn’t even reach the fucking top shelf. Bill was apparently 5’10, which Richie always thought was funny, because 5’10 looks a lot different from down there. 

Richie cleared the stairs and almost ran into Stan, who was walking out of the bedroom holding some folded clothes and what looked to be a toiletry bag. “Hi,” Richie said, then his mouth took the train of thought that it was stuck on and ran with it. “How tall are you?” 

Stan blinked at him for a moment before replying trepidatiously, “Five-ten.”

“And how tall is Bill?”

“In Bill’s mind? Five-ten. Between the two of us, some inches got lost in translation.” 

“Bill lost his inches in your translation? No wonder you two are so close.” Richie cursed himself a little. He didn’t know the guy! And Mike basically kind of said to go easy on Stanley because he’s got a big ol’ stick up his butt. It had yet to be proven but Richie didn’t want to make this living situation and more difficult than it had to be. Stan’s face screwed up at the image.

“Not close in height, though.” Was his response. Richie felt the bullet woosh over his head as it just barely missed him. The two of them stood there looking at each other in the tiny landing of the upstairs. A small landing with a closet, no doubt filled with boring literature and Bill’s old baseball equipment, a bathroom and the two bedrooms. 

“I’m just going to the shower,” Richie said. It was enough to fill in the silence and Stan looked grateful for it being broken.

“Oh, sure. It’s in through there-” He pointed to the door behind Richie. “I took Mike and Bill’s bedroom but the spare is… that one, obviously.” The spare bedroom door was shut, Stan had left the other ajar.

“Yeah, I know where the bathroom is,” Richie said.

“Yeah, sorry.” He was. “I keep forgetting. I’ve met all of Mike’s friends so it’s a little strange. Sorry.” 

“Yeah…” Another awkward silence. “So… heading to the shower too?” He nodded to the bundle in Stan’s arms.

“Yes. You can go first if you like. I take a while.” Richie could imagine that. Hair like that doesn’t usually curl well unless time and effort are put into it. Richie remembers his mom buying all sorts of expensive conditioners and shampoos to enhance the curls of her hair. Without it, her hair went frizzy and big, a couple of warts away from hunching over a cauldron à la double bubble toil and trouble. Richie considered Stanley’s hair for longer than he was comfortable with, so he blurted out the first thing that popped into his head.

“How’s say we save water?” His eye spasmed without permission into a wink. Richie Tozier was suave, in the sort of over-exaggerated way that was half kidding. It was his charm and it, surprisingly, worked. Richie picked up a few men and women with his overly cheesy lines. These lines came naturally, to potential one-night-stands and friends but good god, not to someone he has never met before who seems to be kind of uptight and uncomfortable with his presence that he is literally  _ trapped _ with. 

Richie held his breath and tried not to let his face give away his regret at letting that sentence run from his mouth. Stan looked at Richie with a polite smile. His cheeks twitched with the effort, Richie noticed. “I don’t think…” Stan looked Richie up and down. “You’d fit.” He smiled apologetically at Richie, who couldn’t help himself from laughing.

“You’re a bitch.” 

“Am I kind or am I a bitch? Make up your mind.” Stan said with a momentary flash of a real smile which Richie would almost describe as cheeky. Richie curtseyed Stan towards the bathroom and said that he would unpack first and shower when Stan’s done. Stan nodded and went to the bathroom without another word. 

Richie grabbed his bag from downstairs and made his way to the spare. The doorknob took some wriggling to open. It was lucky it opened when it did, any longer and Richie would have just forced it open and footed the bill. He wasn’t very patient. So when the door opened, the contents behind it left him speechless. His bag dropped to the floor with a heavy thud. He’s going to strangle Mike and Bill with his bare hands. 

In the shower, Stan heard a dull thud from outside the door and over the sound of the running water, which admittedly, wasn’t very loud given the poor water pressure, a very clear deadpan: ‘oh, well that’s not good.’ He spent the remainder of the shower contemplating what could be wrong with the spare bedroom. Knowing Bill, it’s possible that it’s a mess. Baseball equipment, old books, impulsively-bought furniture from thrift stores shoved into the corners. Actually, if he’s thinking hoarding, Mike is terrible for hoarding. Mike insists it’s all a part of studying history, but Stan really doubts that Mike needed antique jewellery boxes from 1850’s Russia, or the cracked pocket mirror from the early 1910’s. 

It’s entirely possible that Mike and Bill haven’t cleaned the spare room since they moved in, he can imagine the thick layer of dust covering the window sill, the shelves, the dresser, the headboard. The blankets are probably musty-smelling. Stan took Mike and Bill’s blanket off of their bed in lieu of his own, he would give Richie that and wash the spare for him. The smell of disuse is hard to get rid of. The smell of stagnation isn’t so easy to mask, it lingers, the smell of being completely devoid of human presence stains a room for a long time. Stan thinks he saw a scented candle in one of cupboards in the kitchen, he could give it to Richie for his room. He contemplates this as he washes his hair and wanders briefly what candle scents Richie would prefer.

His mind wanders. Not insidiously, but it wanders nonetheless. The sounds of Richie walking across the landing, talking to himself, the sound of heavy footsteps up and down the stairs. It should bother him, but truthfully, he welcomes the presence. The presence of another person in a shared space, the threat of company is a welcome one for once. The jury is still out on the person himself, though. 

When Stan exits the bathroom with a pillow of steam and damp hair, he sees the door to the spare room is open. Stan isn’t the type to go peeping into every open door he sees - an open door isn’t necessarily an invitation to explore - but he peers in anyway, the curiosity of what the spare room looks like overtaking him.

There he sees Richie on a desk chair, rolling lazily along the floor. The desk chair to a desk. The desk which appears to be the centerpoint of what is supposed to be the second bedroom of this two-bedroom apartment, now a study. They flipped it into a study. Stan looks around at the assortments of bookshelves, the desk, the mis-matched chairs and shelves undoubtedly picked up at thrift stores by Mike’s keen eye on historical furniture. Then his eyes were drawn to Richie, who didn’t look upset as much as amused. Richie rolled over to a bookshelf and pulled out a battered hardback. “Think I could rip the pages out of this and fashion them together into a blanket? You got a stapler?” 

“Yeah, never shower without one.” Stan said, faraway as he considered the study. It was, as he expected, full of knick-knacks and old-looking pieces of clutter. It felt like the door was a portal into some eccentric antique-dealer’s backroom, not like the spare bedroom of a New York apartment. “This isn’t good.” 

“Hey! That’s what I said.” Richie gestured with the book at Stan. “We’re rubbing off on each other already.” Stan pulled a face at that. Richie had such a clumsy way with words. “I didn’t mean it like that, but you were probably thinking about it in the shower. Stanley, you’re a  _ dawg _ .” The drawl on dog sounded like it was a Russian accent wearing a vague New York disguise. Stan didn’t aknowledge the sentence, having actually thought about Richie in some capacity in the shower, he didn’t have as sturdy ground to stand on to retaliate. 

“I should call Bill,” Stan said.

“Oh?” Richie dropped the book onto the desk. “Are you going to ask him to deliver a spare bed?”

“Maybe they’ve hidden the mattress somewhere?”

“ _ Hidden _ it? Where? In Narnia? This apartment is the size of a burrow, you couldn’t hide a matchbook in here, nevermind a mattress. The only place you could hide a mattress in this place would be the… the fucking walls.” Stan glared at him. He was trying to help, and here he was, swivelling back and forth on the desk chair and being argumentative. Richie noted the response and nodded. “I see all I’m giving you is ideas where to hide my body.” 

“And a headache.” Stan said, moving to leave the room. He began scrunching his hair dry with the towel around his neck. “I’m going to text Bill.” When he got to the bedroom,  _ his _ bedroom, he heard the noise of Richie following him and sure enough, Richie was behind him. “Oh, you’re following me.”

Richie stared at him. “Am I not supposed to? Have you got naughty things in there?”

“What? No. It’s just-” He was going to say ‘it’s just my room, i’m private.’ but it wasn’t his room. None of his belongings were out on the open. Despite not feeling entirely comfortable with it, he let Richie follow him into the room because he really didn’t have much to argue with. 

_ 00:20 _ _   
_ _ Are you up? Richie went to go to sleep but the spare room has mysteriously been transformed into a study. Surely you have the mattress somewhere? It came with the place, you’d lose your deposit. Or something like a mattress, I dont know. Something for Richie to sleep on _

_ 00:20 _ _   
_ _ *like* a mattress? _ _   
_ _   
_ _ Like an air mattress? Is that what ur looking? _

_ 00:21 _ _   
_ _ Yes!  _

_ 00:22 _ _   
_ _ Sorry no we dont have anything like that _ _   
_ _   
_ _ and yeah we’re not getting our deposit back but there is a long long list of reasons for that nevermind the missing bed _

_ 00:22 _ _   
_ _ I dont even think I want to know the details of that Bill. Where is richie going to sleep?  _

_ 00:23 _ _   
_ _ the archway in kitchen WAS a door. RIP (both the verb and rest in peace)  _ _   
_ _   
_ _ richie sleeps standng up like horse lol  _ _   
_ _   
_ _ Share the bed?  _

_ 00:24 _ _   
_ _ I am NOT sharing a bed. _

_ 00:24 _ _   
_ _ We used to share a bed all the time? And you shared a bed with Eddie during our xmas party _

_ 00:24 _ _   
_ _ Bill. We were kids. And sharing a bed with Eddie is like sleeping next to a house cat, only marginally better smelling. I’m not sharing a bed with a stranger.  _

_ 00:25 _ _   
_ _ Good grief stanley brown _ _   
_ _   
_ _ Im kidding. He can sleep on the couch, he’ll be fine. He’s slept in our bathtub before so itll be like the four seasons this time round _

_ 00:26 _ _   
_ _...bathtub? _

_ 00:26 _ _   
_ _ Dont mix drugs and alcohol is all im saying _ _   
_ _   
_ _ Dont do school. Stay in drugs , stanley _

_ 00:26 _ _   
_ _ Right. Okay, thanks. Goodnight _

_ 00:26 _ _   
_ _ Goodnight sleep tight dont let the bed bugs bite lol _ _   
_ _ 00:32 _ _   
_ _ There are no bed bugs i was kidding just in case your freaking. At least i dont think there are. I havent woke up with bites before _ _   
_ _ Well .. only good bites if you know what im saying haha _ _   
_ _ 00:38  _ _   
_ _ Oh i probably shouldnt say that when youre sleeping in me and mike’s bed lol sorry. Good night :)  _

_   
_ Stan relayed the important pieces from this information to Richie, who was snooping around the room. He was in the middle of examining some weird sculpture on the dresser when Stan broke the silence. Richie listened patiently, tapping a mindless tune on the sculpture. He didn’t seem to be fulle concentrating, given that he hadn’t looked Stan in the eyes and was still mindlessly playing with the strange object but when Stan mentioned the bathtub, which he did attempt to breeze over quickly, Richie dropped the sculpture, which the more Stan looked at it, the more it looked like a naked woman. Probably a gift from one of Bill’s classmates, who were more avant-garde than they really had a right to be, but hey, that’s New York. 

“That bastard, ratting me out like that. Drugs and alcohol - he makes me sound like I was methed out of my head with two bottles of merlot in me.”

“Well,” The curiosity got the better of him, “what  _ were _ you on?” 

“Baby stuff, Stanley!”

“Like maraju-”

“The cheapest whiskey in Walmart and cocaine. That’s the college student entry pack. ‘Drugs and alcohol’. Fucking drama queen.”

Stan wasn’t quite sure what to say in response. He sure didn’t get that in his college entry pack and given the psychosomatic ache his back has developed thinking about sleeping in a bathtub, he’s not convinced he mourns the loss. For lack of a response, Stan gathered Mike and Bill’s rolled-up blanket from under the bed, where Stan had carefully stored it. He gathered the pillows from there too and handed them to Richie, who took a second to snap into action. “Thank you,” Richie said. 

“It’s nothing. Will you be warm enough?” 

“No. I’d be warmer in here.” 

“Well tough shit,” Stan said, “I was here first.”

“Hoo-lawdy do, that there’m boy gots a filthy mouth!” Richie said in a strange voice. It was a mix of Alabama and vaguely Eastern-European. Stan, again, wasn’t quite sure what to say in response. So he told Richie, in a very adult and serious voice, to get out of his room and leave him alone. Richie gathered his pillows and blanket and left him alone, voicing his complaints for this unfair treatment. 

Sure, Stan feels a little bad as he drifts off to sleep, but Stan was here first and Stan has never slept in a bathtub before. He hears shuffling every now and again from downstairs and it comforts him for reasons he can’t place. He remembers the warmth of Eddie curled up behind him that night they shared a bed during the house party for winter break. He was a small nuclear reactor, curled up like a sleeping housecar, completely unaffected by the sweltering heat radiating from his body. It was cold in the apartment, Mike and Bill were too frugal to dish out for heating bills, so Stan wiggled closer to Eddie - as close as he could get before crossing the line into cuddling territory, and slept easily. Stan slept easier this night than he had in lockdown yet. 

\----

Richie’s arrival seemed to have ignited some productive spark within Stan. The one that had been snuffed out by the lack of motivation when drifting through the apartment trying to satiate his own desperate boredom. He woke up at a decent time with the sun streaming in through the curtainless windows. Checking his phone, and replying to some funny pictures Ben had sent him, he realised that he was up in time to attend his 9:00 am online lecture. He didn’t even really consider if he could be bothered, if his motivation had come back before he already had his laptop open on his bed and was signing in. 

He waved to his classmates in the call and genuinely wished them well and hoped they were all keeping safe. The modern ‘how-are-you-doing’. Despite his absence from classes recently, he hadn’t fallen as far behind as he had initially thought. He had to work on a couple of things for an hour or two after the class was technically finished to submit them, but it wasn't as big of a setback as he had thought. He worked diligently and didn’t allow himself a break to even get himself a drink until he had everything done. It was a bad habit, his perfectionism, but it served him well sometimes - although his grumbling stomach would disagree.

With his earphones in and his music playing, he hadn’t heard any sign of life from Richie at all. Stan finished his work and went downstairs, realising half-way down that he was hungry. It’s lunchtime and while Stan was considering what he was going to put on his sandwich, he breached the living space. His appetite died in his stomach. 

It was a bomb-site. The blanket Richie had been sleeping with was thrown to the ground, pillows and cushions too. There were soda cans and half-empty cups of coffee littering the floor and the coffee table. Not a coaster in sight. And… Stan sniffed the air. The faint smell of cigarette smoke. Bill was messy as a kid, and Stan remembers in great vividity how much he hated going to Bill’s bedroom because he would spend hours cleaning it with Bill before he could relax properly. Never like this, though. This wasn’t messy or disorganised… this was just…  _ dirty. _

The familiar ball in his gut began to tighten. Stan was born with a ball of yarn in his gut and it wrapped around his abdomen, tight under his ribs and across his breastbone, and looped around his neck. Whenever things were out of place, dirty, offensive to his senses, the ball would tighten. The yarn would tighten around his chest and ribs until his breathing got tight and he was wheezing through a pinhole in his throat. Stan had a great therapist throughout his teen years: himself, so he rarely had panic attacks any more as a result but the sight of disorder and … whatever you could call the sight before him, still set him on edge. And truthfully? It made him a little upset. 

This was Mike and Bill’s home. They paid for it and they welcomed Stan and Richie into it during such a horrible time. The trust and care that is knitted into the walls of this apartment were done so by Mike and Bill’s careful hands. Stan treated this apartment with more respect than he would his own. Maybe it was the way he was raised, or maybe it was just his nature, but the sight he was currently staring motionless at was as unexpected and as left-field as seeing a lion curled up on the couch. 

Stan barely registered Richie coming out of the kitchenette until he was flopping onto the beanbag in the corner of the room with a cup of instant ramen. He was wearing the same clothes that he had been in last night and with a pang of disgust, Stan realised the probability that Richie had slept in them. Richie pushed his glasses into his hair to eat. 

“Monin’. I heard you talking upstairs. Online classes, huh?” Richie said. He slurped his ramen obnoxiously. A noodle slapped against his cheek and left a wet spot. 

“Wh-why is-this place-what did-” Stan tightened and loosened his fists and took a deep breath. He started again. “Why is the place so….” He gestured to the everything.

“What? It’s not that bad.” Richie said. More slurping.

“Richie… it’s a mess.”

“You’re being dramatic, it’ll take five minutes to clean. It’s just trash.”

“It would take no minutes to clean if you cleaned the mugs when you’re done with them and throw stuff out when it’s finished!” 

Richie paused his slurping and moved his head quickly for his glasses to bounce back onto his nose. They sat too far down and Richie had to move his head back in an unnatural way to see Stan. “Gee, you’re pretty pissed about it.” 

“I’m not pissed.” Stan was trying to hold onto some shred of politeness. Richie raised his eyebrows. “Yes. Yes, I’m pissed.” 

“What’s the big deal?” 

“How can you work in this?” Stan walked over to the blanket and folded it neatly. He accidentally kicked an empty soda can across the floor. Richie just shrugged in response and kept eating. Stan could feel Richie watching him while he picked up cushions and pillows and returned them to their rightful spot on the couch. Even with all the cans and coffee cups still lying everywhere, it looked so much better already. It really isn’t that hard. “I’m serious. How do you work like this here? We don’t know how long we’re stuck here, you should be treating this place like you would your own home.”

“I have maids at home, you see.”

“Right.” Stan felt a headache blooming. Partly because Stan didn’t fair well staring at screens, it wasn’t something he was used to, having been raised in a house with a TV that was only turned on during weekends. Partly he knew it was because of the mess and the stress Richie was giving him.

“No, I’m serious. They don’t even wear panties.”

“I’m not your fucking maid, Richie.” Stan picked up the can he kicked and crossed his arms.

“You can wear panties if it makes you more comfortable,” Richie said. 

Stan felt his jaw muscles working diligently to hold back the string of curses. He spoke carefully. “Why are you being like this?”

Richie slurped long and hard. “It’s cute.” 

“You’re insufferable.” 

“I have a big personality,” Richie corrected. Stan opened his mouth to unleash a circle of hell but Richie’s hand cut him off. “I’ll clean. Let me finish my food then I’ll clean up, okay?” 

“Okay.” Stan’s shoulders loosened from the tension he was carrying. 

True to his word, after Richie finished his ramen, he collected the cups and dropped them in the sink. He took the soda cans to the trash. He filled the sink with hot water but Stan, who had been on his phone pretending not to watch, stopped him. “Let me wash the dishes.”

“Oh, thank-”

“You probably won’t do them right.” Stan squeezed behind Richie and pushed him gently to the side. Stan was right. This kitchenette was borderline claustrophobic with the two of them in it. Richie seemed to take up the entire space. Surprisingly, Stan didn’t really mind, it had been so long since he stood so close to someone it was almost kind of nice. He wouldn’t ever admit it to Richie though. He considered that maybe Bill and Mike should make food together, even though it is cramped, Stan can imagine how comforting it would be to work in such close quarters to the one you love while preparing dinner together. Stan took one of the mugs Richie had brought in and began scrubbing it. Richie mumbled under his breath. “What was that?” 

“I said: you’re worse than Eddie.” 

Stan paused his scrubbing of a coffee stain then resumed. “I didn’t know you knew Eddie.” 

“I told you, I know all of Mike’s friends. I meet up with Eddie every time he’s in New Yowk.” Richie’s accents were so bad that they almost made Stan laugh. 

“I didn’t know that. So you know Ben and Beverly then?” 

“Oh yeah, Haystack is great. I don’t blame Beverly, I’d climb the guy like a tree too. Beverly pretends she doesn’t think I’m hot shit then spends two hours teaching me how to walk the dog.”

“Walk the dog?” 

“Wanna see?” Before Stan had the chance to reply, Richie had gone back into the living space and returned a few moments later with a yo-yo. He proceeded to walk the dog. It was a short and limp walk but a walk nonetheless. “Cool, right?”

“Sure.” Stan put the washed up on the drying rack. Richie, without prompting lifted it and grabbed a nearby drying towel. “You didn’t bring your own blanket but you brought a yo-yo?”

“Mike and Bill don’t have a yo-yo, do they?” Richie put the cup down and took the one Stan was handing him.

“I suppose that’s a point.” Not a good one, but a point. Stan grabbed the next cup on the counter beside him and only when he recognised the bagel through the sudsy water did he realise that it was his cup. “Oh - uh-” Richie looked at him. “This is my cup. I brought it here… could you not use it?” He said as politely as he could. 

“Sure. Eddie hates sharing stuff like that too. I took a drink from his water bottle once and he almost fainted.” 

“Yeah, Eddie gave me the idea. I bought them when I lived in the dorms because I hated drinking from the communal mugs.” Stan washed this mug a little more carefully than the others and then handed it carefully to Richie. Richie laughed when he read it. 

“Are you Jewish or something? Or just a big fan of bagels?”

“Both.” Richie laughed but it died when he realised Stan wasn’t kidding.

“Oh- for real?” Stan nodded. “So you don’t eat pork and shit?”

“Well, I wasn’t raised particularly strict. So it’s a vague yes to pork and a hard no to shit. The only meat I really eat often is chicken, though.” 

“Ah...alright.” Richie nodded solemnly, in great thought. “Is that why you do accounting?” Stan splashed dirty dishwater at him. 

They finished cleaning up in good time, even if Richie did kick up a fuss when Stan lifted out the vacuum. Richie seemed adverse to every step Stan insisted on doing to make this space more liveable and argued while taking the vacuum from Stan’s hands. Finally, Stan got the candle from upstairs and put it on the coffee table and lit it. “For the smell,” Stan said in response to Richie’s questioning look. Richie’s eyes went wide and he sniffed his shirt. “The smell of smoke, Sherlock.” Richie gave him the finger but retreated to the shower anyway. When he came back downstairs, he was wearing a different pair of sweats and one of Mike’s t-shirts. It was only a little loose, which was surprising, considering that MIke usually dwarfs everyone in his clothes. Stan reckoned that if Richie worked out a little then he would fill the shoulders with no issue. 

“What are you doing?” Richie asked casually as he dug a tobacco pouch from his bag and began rolling a cigarette. He had big hands. Stan was interested in how such big, caveman hands could perform a task which required a pretty good degree of delicacy. Stan was pretty good at rolling them, as he had done so for Beverly many times when she had one too many beers at a party and couldn’t quite roll them right. Richie raised his head to look at him, waiting for an answer.

“Nothing. Just reading.” He raised his book and showed the cover. Richie squinted, his glasses were still slightly steamed from the shower. “The Iliad.” 

“Ah. Apollo and shit?” Richie licked a stripe up the paper to stick it down. He put the cigarette between his lips and dug in his pockets for a lighter. It bobbed gently with the movements.

“Uh- yeah. Something like that.” Richie’s eyebrows furrowed as he checked his pockets for a second time. “It’s on the window ledge. By the fire escape.” 

Richie grabbed it and lifted the window. “Sorry for the breeze, amigo,” he said as he stepped out to have his cigarette on the fire escape. It took Stan a minute or two to pull his eyes away from Richie’s back and onto his book. 

When Richie came back in, he left the window open a little to circulate the air, then plopped down on the opposite side of the couch, and popped a pair of earphones in and began typing away on his laptop. He seemed less stressed out than he did yesterday, Stan noted. He probably had less work to do today. He seemed to be reading something pretty intently though. Stan brought his attention back to his book. 

Stan and Richie continued to lounge around on the sofa for a good portion of the day. Stan had gotten up and made himself some coffees, a snack, and fetched his laptop and cranked out a couple of hours of studying. He surprised himself with being able to concentrate on studying even with Richie moving restlessly to and from the couch every ten minutes. Getting drinks, getting snacks, going to the toilet, going out for cigarettes, Stan wondered if he was able to sit still for fifteen minutes without bursting into flames. It wasn’t unpleasant at all, even when Richie demanded that Stan make him a coffee when Stan went to the kitchen. Stan was looking for herbal tea, but there was none. Richie thanked him for the coffee. 

Richie was standing in the archway of the kitchenette scrolling through his phone with a cup of instant ramen in his other hand. The second one today. Stan wonders if Mike was a bad influence on Richie or vice versa. That wasn’t what caught Stan’s attention. It was the question Richie asked. “Do you want anything from the store?” Through a mouthful of noodles, “I’m ordering an online delivery, do you want anything?” 

Stan snorted incredulously, thinking of his mint plant now sitting alongside Audrey III and his bruised apples. “You’re better to go to the store and get it yourself.”

“Nah, I always get online delivery. I don’t fancy all my groceries falling on the ground of a subway station when I try and get them all home. I’d get rabies.”

“There’s a store a ten-minute walk from here,” Stan said. “They messed up my online order when I did it.”

“Aww… did they give you almond milk instead of oat? Romaine instead of iceberg? You poor baby, how did you cope?” 

Stan glared at him over his laptop, removing the other earphone he had left in when Richie asked him the question. He considers warning Richie further, but the smug look on Richie’s face stops him. Stan smiles sweetly. “Okay, I’ll take some toothpaste, some brown rice, a box of peppermint tea, and some headache tablets.”

Richie looked up from his phone. “You get bad headaches?” 

Stan shrugged. “Sometimes. Usually the tea helps, probably a placebo thing. I like to have painkillers in reserve just in case.” 

“Were you in the Scouts, by any chance?” 

Stan’s cheeks grew red. “Yes.” He had been in the scouts all of his childhood. Not something he was particularly embarrassed of, but the fact that Richie had correctly guessed that so quickly made him feel observed. “Is it obvious?”

“A clean-freak who is always prepared? No, not at all,” Richie said. He tapped away at his phone and then slipped it into his pocket. “Twenty dollars for same-day delivery. What is the world coming to?” He flopped back onto the couch and returned to his laptop. He stared at it for a minute before putting it onto the coffee table and closing it with his foot. 

“It would be free if you got it yourself,” Stan deadpanned.

“Whatever, Mom. Wanna watch something on the TV? I can’t look at my laptop any longer or my eyes are gonna fall out and plop into my food.” 

Stan considered the question for a moment. He saved his work and shut his laptop, putting it beside Richie’s. “Sure.” 

If you had told Stan that in 2020, he would be locked in someone else’s apartment with a stranger because of a pandemic, and with that time, he chose to spend four hours watching Naked And Afraid, he would have laughed in your face. A change in circumstance can really change a man. 

The delivery arrived when Stan was in the shower. He cleaned off eagerly and made his way downstairs to see if his tea had been delivered, his headache had increasingly gotten worse throughout the day and the steam of the enclosed bathroom had only served to make it worse. He wouldn’t openly admit that he kind of wanted to see if the order had received the same treatment as his own.

When he came down, towelling his hair, Richie was in the kitchenette, squinting at the docket. He pushes his glasses up into his hair and squints back and forth from the list to the groceries spread out over the counters. He looks more offended than Stan did. His eyebrows pulled down and rose in bewilderment, he mouthed words at the list and at one point brought his hand to his forehead in desperation. 

He caught Stan walking into his field of vision and must have noticed Stan’s entertainment because he gave him a tight-lipped smile in return. He showed Stan a container of mixed herbs. “Tobacco.” He grabbed a pack of tortillas. “Rolling papers.” 

Stan gave a solemn nod to validate Richie’s feelings of dismay and befuddlement. “My tea?” He asked. Richie checked the list with scrutiny. 

“Red berry instead of peppermint.” Stan could deal with that. He liked peppermint a little more but Beverly liked red berry and it was the flavour of tea she always made him when he visited her during holidays, Beverly being in Bangor Maine on some fashion internship. It reminded him of her, as do most berry-flavours and smells and he was hit with a wave of sadness. He missed his friends a great deal more than he let on. Even though he wouldn’t be seeing Beverly until the summer break, the realisation that he might not even get to see her until much later in the summer made him hopeless for reasons he couldn’t really express. He took the box of tea from Richie’s hand and said thank you. If Richie noticed his change in mood, he didn’t mention it. He did pull out a container of lube and stared at it with a disproportionate amount of anger.

“You’ve got to be shitting me.” Stan stared at the bottle of lube in Richie’s hand longer than necessary. 

“Wrong type?” He asked, not really wanting the answer.

“The one time in my life that I actually wanted hand lotion for my  _ hands. _ The  _ one _ time.” Richie shortened himself and waved the lube dramatically before throwing it in the general direction of the coffee table. Stan heard it hit the floor. Stan shimmied past Richie and made himself a cup of tea. He put the groceries away while Richie continued ranting about hand lotion. Stan had some in his toiletry bag and he would be sure to tell Richie that the moment that this stops being amusing. He made Richie a coffee and handed it to him when it was ready. Richie’s mouth lingered open where it was caught mid-rant and he went silent, staring at the cup. 

“Do you take milk?” Stan asked, not sure why Richie had been staring strangely at the cup of coffee Stan had slipped into his hand. 

“Uh, thanks. Do you?” Richie said after snapping his mouth shut and holding the cup in a more natural position. Stan raised an eyebrow in confusion. “Take milk, I mean. In your coffee.”

“This is tea,” Stan said, holding the cup up closer to Richie. Richie sniffed the air and nodded. 

“Well, do you take it in your coffee then?”

Stan made a non-commital noise, “Depends.”

“On...?”

“If I feel like it? There really isn’t a lot of factors I take into account making my coffee in the morning. You’re looking at me like that’s a boring answer.”

“It  _ is _ a boring answer. God - you’re so  _ boring,  _ Stanley.” 

“Says the one who ordered four share bags of ‘original’ flavoured chips.” 

Richie sucked his teeth. “Yeah, you’ve got me there.” He scratched his neck. “I don’t like hot food.” Stan grew confused because not three minutes ago, he loaded away a bottle of  _ ‘XXX-Kitchen TRIPLE THREAT Devil’s HOT SAUCE’ _ into the cupboard. He told Richie this and Richie slumped dramatically against the archway, crumpling the docket into his face, making dramatic sounds of distress. “I ordered ranch. I ordered ranch…”

Stan manoeuvred around Richie’s moping and made for upstairs, he hesitated and asked, “Did the docket say the employee’s name was Gary?” Richie nodded in response.

“Yes, Gary. Why?” He said, still holding said docket into his face.

“I wouldn’t trust that kid to deliver a Limerick, nevermind someone’s groceries.” 

\--

The groceries were manageable, the substitutions were irritating, yes, but Richie was an adaptable man, his curry-flavoured noodles were equally as interchangeable as barbeque-flavour. It was difficult at first, the change. Richie had come so far in his life with the motions of curry-flavoured, it was a part of him, an almost daily ritual. These times are difficult and confusing, and sure, he may still be working from his 2017 second-hand Dell laptop, and he may still exclusively get his groceries delivered and order Uber Eats, his life is as stationary as it has ever been, but the noodles, oh lord, the noodles. Such a big change to have to adapt to. It was difficult, but he is holding out strong.

So far Richie has blasted through three seasons of Hell’s Kitchen, two seasons of Criminal Minds, a fairly in-depth analysis video about the history of Vampires in Young Adult Novels - which seemed the most engaging of them all. He forwarded it to Bill, thinking he would appreciate Richie’s interest in literature, he was responded to with a middle-finger emoji. Bill must be on Team Jacob, he reasoned. 

He had been working pretty contently from the couch for the past… what was it now? A week? Ten days? He really couldn’t say. Stan usually had a better grip than he did on the passage of time, having to somewhat keep track for class. Richie was under the impression that today was a weekday, having heard Stan’s voice muffled from his room, engaged in conversation. Normally Stan’s classes were finished sometime around midday because Stan, of course, is that freak who actually chooses the 8 am classes which is why, it being midafternoon, Richie went through the motions of having to actually check the date and time himself since Stan had not yet graced him with his presence. It was a Saturday. No classes on Saturday. This put a dent in Richie’s plans for the day for two reasons:

  1. Richie had planned his day around having an article to submit by the end of the week. Whoopsie-daisy! The end of the week was Friday and Richie is henceforth up to his ankles in shit from his boss come Monday morning. Bummer, obviously, but he’s going to get killed whether or not he actually has an article written by then, so may as well _not._
  2. Stan had a routine of going out for a walk every Friday, apparently, his Friday classes were long and boring and the walk helped clear his head. So Stan usually went and got some groceries on the way back. Richie was going to ask him to pick him up some popcorn because he gave in and bought a subscription to _another_ video-streaming site and had found a movie series that he was planning on binging.



Richie closed his laptop without saving his work: ‘Top Ten Photos From Inside Russia’s Toughest Prison that we Still Owe Royalty Payments For!’ Richie was a big fan of short journalistic pieces that didn’t involve much actual writing. Especially considering that the photos he was using would, despite the title, require purchasing. He gets paid to buy photos out of his company's pocket and upload them to the website, what a wonderful world we live in. 

The talking from upstairs didn’t seem to have any indication of slowing down. Richie reasoned that Stan was probably talking to his family. With a resigned sigh, Richie unpeeled himself from the couch and made way upstairs, pulling a relatively clean sweater from his bag and wiping some crumbs off his sweats. He did the quick one-two in the bathroom. The one-two being brushing his teeth and spritzin’ the pits. 

He decided, being the extraordinarily charitable and kind man that he was, to pop his head in and ask Stanley if he needed anything. It was something Stan did every time he left the house. He would come downstairs, his hair looking just as effortlessly good as ever, a clean pair of jeans and a button-up shirt. Not that this outfit was anything out of what he wore inside but Richie had started seeing him lounge around in jeans less and less as the days went on, clearly Richie was the dominating fashion influence of the two. Stan would open the door, step one foot out, then peak his head back in and ask Richie if he wanted anything at the store, he was heading there anyway. Last week, Stan had brought back the six-pack of soda and the bag of frozen hash browns Richie requested, and that was it. 

“Didn’t you get yourself anything? I thought you were getting stuff too,” Richie asked him.

“Oh, well. I walk past the store anyway, it’s not a big deal.” Stan excused himself upstairs before Richie got a chance to say that no, he doesn’t because Richie watches him out the window sometimes leaving for his walk, and he turns the opposite direction, then walks past the house and to the store and back on his return. With Stan already gone, Richie thanked the man for leaving because he realised just how stalker-ish that sounded. There wasn’t any reason in particular that Richie liked to watch Stan walk down the drive of the apartment, then turn right and within four seconds is out of sight. It was like a different creature. Stanley, out in the wild. He never turned to see Richie watching him because his eyes were always looking into the trees that were planted on the edge of the sidewalk. 

When Richie peeked into Stan’s room, he did so after a series of knocks which went unheard. When he peaked his head in he saw Stan with his back to him on the bed, with someone’s face on his laptop moving too quickly to be anything more than a distorted mess of pixels. Sure enough, the voice was enough to give it away. High-pitched, thin-chested and anxious, Richie knew that huffer and puffer a mile away.

“Eddie!” Richie pushed the door open, which thudded when it made heavy contact with the wall. Stan spun around with a face crumpled into a frown. It wasn’t an  _ angry _ face. It was a stressed face, Stan’s Friday pre-walk face.

“Richie - how many times have I told you to knock?”

“I don’t think you’ve ever said that to me before,” Richie said.

“Yes I have.”

“Nope - isn’t ringing any bells.”

“I have!”

“Enough of the gaslighting, Stanley.” Richie clapped a hand on Stan’s shoulder to balance leaning into the view of Stan’s webcam. “Heya Eds, you still alive in there?” Eddie didn’t respond to him, he just continued on ranting about whatever he was ranting about. He hadn’t stopped moving even to look into the camera and was walking around frantically. “He’s not even listening, is he?” 

Stan, with a pointed look, lifted Richie’s hand off of his shoulder. “No. I’ve been trying to calm him down for the past hour.” Stan rubbed the lines in his forehead, and in response to Richie’s eyebrow raise, “No dice,” He said. “He’s freaking out about all of this. Which is understandable but he’s extra sensitive today…” He ended this with a sideways glance.

“Yeah, yeah. I know how he gets.” Richie does. Richie goes through all the steps of the Kaspbrak tango every time they go out for lunch. The long list of allergens, the medications taken with water during the meal, the rants and the exaggerated wheezing whenever Richie lights up a cigarette and it’s true what they say: you’re not a friend of Eddie Kaspbrak until you talk him out of an asthma attack. “Sorry for this, Stanley,” Richie said. Stan opened his mouth to ask, but Richie shouted Eddie’s name. Now, this caught his attention. Stan was rubbing his head with a scowl pointed directly at Richie, which he pointedly decided to ignore. 

“What the fuck - Richie?! What the fuck are you doing there? Oh my God - as if this couldn’t get any worse.”

“Hey, play nice. You’ll hurt my feelings. Whatcha up to anyway besides running around like a headless chicken.” 

Eddie’s figure stilled in the camera and he glared at the screen. “I don’t have time for this. Where’s Stan?” Stan instinctively moved to get back in-frame but Richie grabbed the laptop and stood up with it, giving Stan a sign to just give him a minute.

“Stan’s dead. You’re dealin’ wit me now, kid.” Richie mimed holding a cigar and almost dropped the laptop. 

“It’s none of your business.”

“Aye, c’mon now. You know Big Tony ain’t gonna let ya friend go unless ya tell him what’s wrong wit’cha.” 

“I thought he was dead?” 

“Ayyy, po-tay-to, po-tat-o.”

“For the love of - you want me to tell you what’s wrong? What could possibly be wrong, huh? It’s not like- it’s not like the world is falling apart and everyone’s dying. Like healthy people, Richie, not just the old and sick and frail, like normal healthy people just - boom - gone. And-and you know I have bad lungs, I have asthma, so I’m at risk and I’m already at risk for so many things and this is just one more thing on top of it and my new inhaler has been delivered - they’re delivering everything to my door and I’m having an asthma attack but I can’t open it because I leave it for forty-eight hours so the virus dies but I kinda need it right now but I can’t get it right now because I’ll get sick. I’ll get sick and I’ll be put in the hospital and you know how bad hospitals are and they have shit like SARS and-and MENSA and- ohmygod I can’t fucking breathe-”

“Go get your fucking sucker, Eds. Your chances of keeling over from your throat going full castro is more likely than you catching anything out there. Besides, you probably have the cure hidden away in one of your rattlin’ bottles already.”

“This isn’t fucking funny asshole. I could  _ die _ \- do you - do you even realise how serious this is?”

“I mean, look on the bright side,” Richie said pleasantly, “at least your mom will only need to buy half a plot of land to drop your tiny body in.” Stan kicked him in the shin for that. This was obviously a joke but Eddie wasn’t particularly in the mood for chucks right now, and he began to spiral even more. Stan made a grab for the laptop but Richie pulled it out of his reach. “Listen. Eddie. Listen to me - yeah, look at me - everything is out to get you, is that what you want to hear? Everything you touch could potentially kill you. Hell, your iPhone that your holding right now could have a malfunction and explode, spraying you with battery acid. There are poisons out there that half a drop could keel you over dead. There are animals so deadly that you’d not even see them coming before you’ve been turned into little more than a shower of red mist. Hell, there’s a plant in my backyard that if you sat under it for ten minutes you’d be dead. All of these things are out there, waiting for  _ someone _ . The chances are small, but yeah, they’re there. The chances of you keeling over and dying on this shitty facetime is much higher, so go get your housewife dish-washing gloves, your disinfectant spray and go take a puff of that lung-sucker.” And he did. 

After fumbling and swearing and wheezing with the box, Eddie took a hearty gulp of air and then said, “The only reason that worked was because I didn’t want the last thing I heard to be your annoying fucking voice,” and hung up. 

“That’s his way of saying thank-you,” Richie said. He gave the laptop back to Stan who was looking at him curiously. Stan took it and nodded. “So.. do you need anything from the store?” 

“Uh… no,” Stan said. Richie shrugged and made to leave, but got caught, “Wait, yes. I do need something,” Stan said, holding Richie’s sleeve. “Can you get me some kiwi fruit?” Richie nodded and it took a good minute for Stan to realise that he was still holding onto Richie’s sleeve and dropped it. Richie left, and when he looked back to shut the door behind him, Stan was still watching him with that curious face.

It was gone by the time Richie presented Stan with a bag of kiwis. 

“These are figs.”

It was gone by the time Richie presented stan with a bag of figs. 

Stan took them anyway and handed Richie a few bucks, which Richie took, only because he would slip it into Stan’s cardigan pocket, which hung on the rack beside the front door, which he wore on his walks from time-to-time. Likewise, Richie always seemed to have a couple of dollars in the pocket of his sweats whenever he changed into a clean pair. They didn’t mention this game, even though Richie knows that Stan has figured out his angle. “It’s fine,” Stan said. “I like figs. Thank you.” 

Richie got his popcorn ready and his soda opened when Stan popped his head out of the kitchenette, preparing the figs. They were a messy business, apparently. Richie figured most fruit was messy business. “They’re showing the Indiana Jones trilogy back-to-back on one of the cable channels now, if you’re looking for something to watch.” 

Richie’s finger hovered on the remote control, where he was about to select to play his movie. “You like Indiana?” He asked, looking over to the archway, waiting for Stan’s face to pop back out and respond. It did. Stan came out sucking juice off of his thumb with a bowl in the other. 

“Who doesn’t?” 

“Alright,” Richie changed the channel, “looks like we’ve only missed the first ten minutes or so.” Stan plopped himself down beside Richie. 

By the time Stan piped up again, Richie had forgotten all about the other movie he had intended to watch, enjoying watching Harrison Ford slutting around with a whip on his hip far too much to concern himself about whatever the plot of the other movie was. He didn’t even remember. “What plant?” Stan asked, “When you were talking to Eddie about the plant in your garden, what was it?” Richie knew, looking at Stan’s curious and irritated eyes that he had likely spent the time Richie was at the store trying to look it up. Genuine curiosity, of course, but also a glimmer of annoyance because Stanley seemed like the type of guy who liked to know everything, didn’t feel comfortable shrugging his shoulders and going ‘guess I’ll never know’, and even more likely, hated having to ask for the answer.

Richie took a mouthful of popcorn. “Water lily.” Richie swore he could hear the eye-roll. 

\--

The movies became a nighttime routine. They would agree on a movie, usually, a cult classic which they either both adore in how camp it is, or slate for how overhyped it is, sit down with some snacks, and watch it. Stan didn’t know that watching movies could be  _ fun _ . Sure he enjoyed them and enjoyed watching them with Bill and Mike, but it was different. Bill would always lament about how important a movie for how it revolutionized the use of colour symbolism, or the use of CGI, or how it invented some important piece of filming equipment or some other technical fact. Every movie did something revolutionary, apparently. Mike wasn’t as bad, but still, Mike liked period pieces and would praise the accuracies as heartedly as he expressed disappointment for its fallacies. With Richie, it was easy. Movies were either fun to watch or not. Richie liked to point out silly things in the background, or rewind bits that made him laugh. They spent about ten minutes rewatching a part of a movie where, in the background, a cat ran into an open glass door. Even Stan was in stitches. 

It was this that Stan was thinking about, at 2am on a cool enough night. It had been warm enough all during lockdown, but it rained today for the first time in a while. Stan had sat on the bed and watched the rain dash against the windows, how it lashed and exploded the lights from traffic lights and headlights. The sound of the rain accompanied by the acoustic music he listens to doing schoolwork, he got everything done twice as fast as usual and was able to read for a while before his eyes started to get the familiar ache and a headache started to blossom.

The excitement the rain brought was soon washed away. It was a weak grasp at the notion of ‘change’. Not much changes nowadays, or at least, nothing good. The rain left the smell of rainwater on the tarmac, it left a chill in the air and condensation on the inside of the windows. More than anything, it left a blanket of melancholy draped carefully over all of New York. The usual domestic sounds of the neighbours below and above: silenced, the sounds of cabs honking their horns on the busy streets below: silenced, the general hum of the city, its lights, its people, its urban wilderness: silenced. Even Richie, who was usually heard bumbling around downstairs, sliding the window up and down to go for smokes on the fire exit, or watching things on the TV, had drifted into the silence. 

Stan decided to get up and have a glass of water, or maybe a tea, to try and calm his mind and restless thoughts enough to fall to sleep. He still had class in the morning, so he would be awake around 7am, although that was growing less and less likely by the minute. He pulled himself out of bed and felt the coolness wrap its place around him where it was once covered by his blanket. Fighting goosebumps, Stan opened the dresser and pulled out his favourite hoodie. It was worn, frayed and had its drawstrings gnawed to threads, but it was his high school baseball hoodie. They all got one after their last game. Stan hit the first home run of the game and Bill, who was terrible on the team and should never have been given a space, wrapped him in a joyous hug and planted a firm kiss on his cheek. 

The nostalgic change in his mood was instant, even if small. The feeling of the familiar fabric on his body made him feel a little more at a home away from home. He sent Bill a quick text telling him to pay his heating bill or he’ll be sending Bill the hospital charges for pneumonia. He didn’t text back, obviously asleep. 

Stan went down the stairs carefully, avoiding the creaks to try and not wake Richie, who he would have to walk past sleeping on the couch to get into the kitchen. He used his phone’s flashlight to navigate the stairs, putting a finger half-over it to lessen the brightness. He soon turned it off when he realised the lamp in the room was on, and Richie wasn’t on the couch. He feels a cold breeze and sure enough, Richie is standing out on the fire escape with a cigarette.

Richie normally stayed up later than Stan, but in the few nights that Stan has struggled to sleep, he’s come to know that Richie normally retires before now. It wasn’t concerning, but it was odd that they both found a sleepless night together. Stan went to the window and leant half-way out of it. His palms rested on the ledge outside the window, the wet brick soaking the cuffs of his sweater. 

Richie hasn’t noticed him. He’s in his boxers and a t-shirt, leaning on the railings with the cigarette burning, thick with ash. He isn’t wearing his glasses. 

“Hey,” Stan said. Richie turned, but didn’t start. Stan gave him a small smile, “Are you alright? Cold?” Richie looked down at his bare legs and mis-matched socks and laughed. 

“I run hot, don’t tell me you didn’t notice,” He winked. He loosened up and settled more naturally into his pose, “I just can’t sleep. You?”

“I can’t sleep either.”

“Yeah,” Richie flicked the ash off his cigarette and took a deep suck of it, “Normally I’m out like a light for nine hours but… I dunno, I think everyone’s having trouble sleeping at the moment.” Stan made a noise of agreement.

“Beverly’s been having bad nightmares.” Richie turned his attention more to Stan. “I don’t know much more about it. Ben told me.” 

“She gets them often. She must be getting them like, every night.” Stan made another noise of agreement but didn’t really want to get into all that right now. Richie must’ve noted the silence because he picked up the pack that was in his hand and gestured to Stan. “Want one?” 

Stan wasn’t a smoker, per say, but he was prone to the occasional pre-exam cigarette, or social smoking during his infrequent nights out. It was a filthy habit, but it hadn’t become a habit, and he doubts that it ever will. Stan steps through the window and onto the fire escape, stretching a little as he did so. He took the pack from Richie and asked for the lighter. Richie was staring at him.

“What are you looking at me like that for?”

“I just - I didn’t think you’d take one.” Stan took the cigarette from between his lips.

“Then why offer?” He was genuinely curious. Richie considered this for a moment, taking a drag to move his thoughts along, but he just shrugged.

“I dunno. Polite?”

“Would you rather I… not take one?”

“No no no-” Richie waved his hand lazily but with a confident air, “It wasn’t a fake offer. Just didn’t expect you to be a smoker.”

Stan put the cigarette between his lips, waiting for Richie to offer him the light. “I’m not. But you know… now and again.” Richie’s eyes lit up and he let out a breathy half-laugh.

“Of course you’re a social smoker. And let me guess - you’ve never bought a pack. Right? I knew it. Makes sense.”

“I wouldn’t say that.”

“I bet,” Richie said, turning to give Stan his full attention, “that no one in the smoking area has ever ‘literally  _ just _ smoked their last cigarette.’” 

“Why would they be in the smoking area if they didn’t have any cigarettes left?” 

“Of course! Of course! I bet you just bat those pretty little eyes and they’re eating out of the palm of your hand, throwing you cigarettes and lighters at you like you’ll turn them to gold.” Stan rolls his eyes and ushers for the lighter again. Richie pulled the lighter from his breast pocket and blocked the wind as he struck it. He stepped closer to Stan and lit his cigarette for him. Stan was so taken aback by how close Richie had gotten so suddenly that he almost forgot to breathe in to light it properly. 

Richie’s face glowed orange in that moment, and his eyes, which were a strong brown, seemed to fleck with orange. Stan couldn’t be sure why he noticed it, but he filed that memory somewhere important in his brain. When Richie moved, he didn’t step out of Stan’s personal space, his feet stayed in place and he rotated to look out over the skyline. Which, admittedly, was less of a skyline and more just a view of the neighboring apartments, but without his glasses Stan was sure it didn’t make a difference to Richie. Richie’s elbow was touching Stan’s. The position Stan was standing in was unnatural and a little awkward, but he couldn’t bring it within himself to move.

Stan isn’t physical, really. But, something he has realised more and more, was how much he missed those small, fleeting glimpses of touch. The shoulder-pats, the quick hugs, the handshakes, all of it. He even missed Beverly ruffling his hair and how her fingers would wiggle over his scalp right before she messed his hair. He watched Richie’s hand steadily as he took another drag. Touch is never something that Stan actively yearned for, but in this moment, with Richie’s elbow gracing his, even through his hoodie, Stan can only think of how lonesome this experience has been. How awful those first days were when he was on his own, how bored he was. Boredom seems like such a fleeting complaint, but not just boredom of lack of stimulation, but boredom of the soul. 

He imagined how awful, how absolutely terrible these weeks would have been if Richie had not shown up out of the blue. It causes goosepimples to crawl up his arms. Imagining how truly, truly alone he would have been, with not even a living soul to greet in the mornings, to eat dinner with, to watch movies with. He would have been well and truly… on his own. For the first time in his entire life, and in such a horrible circumstance. He shifts closer to Richie without really thinking. He follows what feels natural, and it made him feel a little better. He’s glad he’s not alone. 

Richie flicks the butt of his cigarette down into the street below. Stan follows the amber light as if falls to the ground and fades to black upon contact with the wet tarmac. Richie is the one, as usual, to break the silence. 

“You’re a lot nicer than you seem, you know.” Stan turned to him, Richie’s face was open and soft, not like Stan had seen it before. He was going to make a somewhat snarky reply, but it died in his throat. “You come off… as abrupt and sharp. Which I think you almost do on purpose. I dunno - maybe it was just to me, I mean, given the circumstances. But you’re just private and … closed off. Not in a bad way but - I get why Mike likes you - he’s the same way.”

Stan took a deep inhale of the cigarette and suddenly found he didn’t want it anymore. He made to stub it out but Richie took it off his hands and took not a moment before pushing it between his lips. Stan took a moment to regain his train of thought. “If I wanted to be psychoanalysed I would go home to see my parents,” He said. 

“Nuh-uh.” Richie wagged his finger at him. “That’s illegal.” 

Stan propped up his chin and considered it. “Do I… seem rude?” 

“What? No, that’s not what I meant… you’re quiet. And like… unnervingly polite when you want to be. You’re not exactly how Mike described you.”

“Oh?” Stan was suddenly interested, “How did Mike describe me?”

Richie gave a devilish smile. “ABBA on karaoke?” Stan stood upright. 

“Oh for fuck’s sake. That was  _ one _ time! He always holds that over my head.” 

“Three hours, Stanley.” 

“Still technically  _ one time. _ ” 

Richie laughed and relaxed against the ledge. Stan did the same. “I think, after this is all over, me and you should hit the town and burst some eardrums during karaoke night.” 

“Me and you.” Stan said flatly. 

“Yeah!” Richie shot him a grin, it was a tired one, but it was honest. “Me and you are gonna be best friends after this lockdown is lifted. I mean, locked in one tiny New York apartment for… God knows how long.”

“Or one of us will be dead and stuffed in the refrigerator. ”

“Hm? Oh, me?” Stan nods seriously. “I’m bigger.” 

“I’m faster.” 

“Geez, alright. Keep it in your pants. We might come out married if you keep flirting with me like that, Stanley-boy.” Stan lets out a humourless laugh in response. He found himself losing energy as the conversation drew on and now, even outside in the fresh, cool air, Stan’s eyes were drooping. 

Stan tries to speak, but it cut off with a yawn. He covers his mouth with the sleeve of his hoodie then rubs his eye, feeling like a caricature of a cartoon character looking to go for a nap, but his eyes were sore  _ and _ tired - which just makes them all the more pained. “I’m going to bed. You going to stay out here much longer?” He was partially afraid of Richie catching pneumonia. 

“Why? You gonna wait up for me?” Richie asked over his shoulder, eyes following Stan as he crawled through the window. Stan could feel the stare bore into his back. Stan clapped his hands on the window ledge when he was back inside. 

“Richie,” He said in a voice that was softer than he meant it to be, “if I have to wait up for you, it means you’re not going fast enough.” Stan isn’t sure what - exactly that means, but it means something because Richie stilled-mid cigarette lift and stared at him. He saw Richie’s adams apple bob in a heavy swallow before he replied.

“Goodnight, Stan.” 

“Goodnight, Richie.”

Stan realised that Richie had called him ‘Stan’, rather than ‘Stanley’, which is what he had been referring to him as the past couple weeks. At least he thinks it’s a couple of weeks - who can be sure. It may not seem big, he tries to convince himself, since all Stan’s friends call him Stan and only his friends. Stan can’t help but feel this is important, and found himself searching for why it felt so weird until he fell asleep, losing only a little bit of sleep over it. 

\---

Another routine that Stan and Richie had fell into: Richie making Stan coffee in the morning. Stan would always wake up and shower, then make himself coffee and breakfast. Stan is usually bumbling about and half-awake trying to make his coffee and has burned himself more than once, so, for sake of Stan’s health, Richie starts making the coffee when the shower turns off. More often than not, the timing is perfect and Stan is able to enjoy his coffee for a few minutes before coming back to the land of the living and starting on breakfast.

This morning was the same: Richie woke up to his alarm, then ten minutes or so later, Stan’s bedroom door opened and Stan started the shower; Richie waited for the absence of noise from the shower; Richie made a coffee. The difference of this morning was that Stan didn’t come downstairs and his coffee was losing heat by the minute. Richie noticed that Stan got out of bed a little later than usual but he didn’t think much of it but now, with the Statue of Liber-tea looking back at him, he realised that Stan is arguably human, and likely slept in. 

Richie weighed his options for a laughably long time. I mean, he was whispering arguments to himself in his reflection about whether or not to bring the coffee up to Stan. Stan - and that was another thing - he dropped the ‘ley’. Richie was generous with nicknames, in fact, he had a list of friends that he doesn’t even remember their real names, but this felt different. Stan had let him drop the letters. Richie was following Stan’s lead with… something. Their relationship was getting stronger which was good, I mean, they’re locked in an apartment together, but it feels weird. Richie feels strange about the entire deal, like he wants Stan to like him. 

Richie, who had been bullied all through his childhood, had shifted the need to be liked in relationships. Richie doesn’t really give a shit whether people like him or not, it’s not his deal because he’s hilarious so it’s their loss really. Stan was different. He really wanted Stan to like him. Richie groaned to himself. All this thinking was wearing him out. He decided to get up, stop overthinking, and just bring Stan his damned coffee. 

When he knocks on Stan’s door, Stan makes a short noise to tell him to come in. When he enters, he sees Stan on his laptop, turned to face him, with one earphone in and the other dangling. He’s in a Zoom call and Richie is on camera. Richie pauses at this but waves at the camera awkwardly. He mouths ‘sorry’ to Stan, not wanting to talk over anything important. He carefully puts the coffee on the bedside table, shifting some papers out of the way. 

Stan follows him carefully with his eyes, ignoring his call. “Is that- oh - is this coffee?” Richie nods. “Oh! Thank you.” He gives Richie an honest smile and holds it for a moment. Richie thinks Stan has a very nice smile. It drops soon enough when Stan starts and swivels back to the call, “Yes, professor, I’m listening.” He nods along to whatever is being said for a moment, and just as Richie was about to turn and leave, Stan turns enough so his face isn’t visible in the call and pulls a grimace. Richie curtseyed dramatically and left. 

When he turned to close the door he fully expected to see the back of Stan’s head, but instead he caught Stan’s eyes, who was watching him and taking a deliberate drink of coffee. 

Downstairs, Richie made himself some cereal and flicked on to whatever shitty tv show was playing when the tv turned on. He wasn’t paying attention, rather, he found himself thinking about Stan. He was nice, actually. Sure, he was closed off at first, but something had changed and last night felt like the fulcrum of the change. Maybe it was just an illusion because it was late at night and late-night conversations always seem more important than what they actually are, but he doesn’t know… it’s weird.

They’re not really close… not really friends. They butt heads and Stan usually has a passive aggressive comment every day about something: butter knives sitting out, cups not washed properly, bin not emptied right. Until Stan came along, Richie didn’t even know there was a wrong way to empty a bin. Yet, as he was sitting eating his - Stan’s - Bran Flakes, he finds himself looking over to Stan’s side of the sofa and wishing Stan’s class would just finish already. 

The coffee became, over the next week, somewhat of a habit. Every morning, if Stan wasn’t downstairs by ten, Richie would assume he’s in class and would bring him up a cup of coffee in his ‘Liber-tea’ mug, which he learned was Stan’s favourite. Richie always waves to his class whenever he comes in, and every time Stan goes a little red in the face and pulls his earphones from his ears. 

It was a nice little habit which Richie liked more than he would be willing to say. He grew up an only child, a little spoiled, and his current roommate (real roommate) usually only stumbled home for a few hours in the dead of night before class, then wouldn’t return until 4am the next day, and rinse and repeat. Honestly, Richie never had much opportunity to do things for other people. Sure, he helped Mike on the farm when he was little, did chores for his neighbors for pocket money, he bought people nice and usually expensive presents on their birthdays, but those were big things. The big things matter, but it’s the little things that add bulk, they’re not expected of you and they might only take a little time or a little effort, but there’s no reason to do them, no birthdays, no christmases, none of that. Richie makes Stan coffee in the morning because he wants to, and he likes the smile that Stan gives him when he turns to close the door when he leaves.

One morning, Stan didn’t have his earphones in, and when Richie came in, he began searching around his blanket for them, but it was too late. A chorus of ‘Oh! It’s 10am everyone, Stan’s boyfriend is here’, ‘look, Stan’s going red!’, ‘Hi, Stan’s boyfriend how are you!’, ‘How long have you two been dating, Stan won’t tell us!’. Mortified, Stan just muted his laptop and took the coffee with a red face. Richie tried his hardest not to laugh, because Stan, for the first time, looks like he would love for the ground to swallow him whole. There was no smile this time when he took the coffee, he just turned back to his laptop and hovered his finger over the unmute button, waiting for Richie to leave.

Richie was about to, but couldn’t help himself. He reached over and ruffled Stan’s hair with a forced, overdramatic look of affection. The windows of his classmates bustled with activity at that. Stan, however, sat still as death. He turned, slowly. His eyes of pure hatred. He glared hard enough for Richie to back away, but not before Stan gave him a sharp kick in the leg. ‘I hate you’, Stan mouthed. 

Richie couldn’t help himself laughing when he left, and only laughed harder when he heard the commotion coming from Stan’s laptop when he unmuted it. He didn’t think too much about the fact that Stan’s classmates call him his boyfriend. He really doesn’t. He doesn’t have to re-watch the same episode of Narcos twice because he couldn’t concentrate on it. 

\--

Stan got the news sometime around the evening. His childhood cat had passed away. Granted, she was almost as old as he was, so it really didn’t come as a surprise, but it had hurt. He didn’t only feel sad for her passing, but he felt guilty for not being there. He felt absolutely awful for her having passed away while he is boxed up in New York. 

He texted Ben about it, and Ben made him feel a little better about it all, but it wasn’t the same. The physical sensation of someone sitting in his space, dedicating their time to being with him was something that he hadn’t considered a thing at all, really. Not before. Now, he wants it more than anything. 

Stan is crying. He knows this. Stan has sensitive eyes, is what his parents always said, and he supposes it’s true. His eyes overflow with tears frequently and often, and it isn’t really indicative of how upset he is - it just happens. With Bill, it was normal, Bill was a crier too, although Bill cried because he was emotional, far too empathetic for his own good. Even with the difference, it was comfortable, Stan didn’t feel shame when he cried around Bill. 

But downstairs was Richie. He didn’t want someone who didn’t know him like that to see him cry and ask questions, but he especially didn’t want Richie to see him cry. But he knew that he didn’t have a choice, really.

He considered Ben’s advice which was something he probably pulled out of a self-help book. He elected to ignore it and ordered an online delivery of alcohol. If Stan was going to cry in front of Richie, he was going to do it drunk, he was going to have something to blame it on and maybe, just maybe, the alcohol would soften the blow of what had happened. 

He waited for his eyes to dry before going downstairs. Richie was working away on his laptop, stretched out in pajama bottoms and a tee with his feet propped up on the table. “Hey, Stan.” He said without turning. The silence that followed indicted him to do so. “What’s wrong? What happened?” 

“What do you mean?”

“Stan, you’re crying.” Stan felt his cheeks and sure enough, his eyes had betrayed him once again and had turned on the waterworks some time between leaving his bedroom and walking downstairs. 

“I have the annoying habit of doing that from time-to-time.” Stan tried to push it off as casually as possible, but Richie wasn’t having it. He shut his laptop and turned around, folding his arms over the back of the couch.

“What happened?” 

“Cat died,” He said, shocking himself for saying so. Richie had this way of pulling words from him like a magician pulling coloured napkins from his sleeve. The image of Richie in a rainbow wig and big red nose makes Stan snort. Richie raised an eyebrow at that.

“I’m sorry. That sucks.” 

“That sucks? That’s your snippet of wisdom?” Richie shrugged.

“Will anything I say make you feel better?” Richie asked. Stan thought about it.

“No,” He said honestly. Richie made a ‘see my point’ gesture and Stan pulled up the grocery order on his phone. “I ordered beer and wine.” Richie’s interest skyrocketed. 

“Can you add something in for me? I haven’t had a drink in ages. I feel like I’m fourteen again.”

“I already did.”

“I don’t drink beer.”

“The beer is for me.”

“Oh - oh. Yeah, okay, thanks.” 

“You like wine, don’t you?” Stan was unsure now, he had been confident but Richie’s reaction was throwing him.

“Yeah - I do. But how did you know that?” 

“Well,” Stan folded his arms, “how did you know I eat vegetable chow mein?” This made Richie laugh. He took his glasses off and rubbed his eyes, wiping away nonexistent tears.

“I just knew.” Stan mirrored Richie’s gesture from earlier pulled a face and flipped back over to sit on the couch. 

“Want to watch Dance Moms?”

“Absolutely not,” Stan said, already making his way to the couch. 

They watched a few episodes, but Stan had trouble getting involved in Richie’s silly voices and the bits they would usually do when watching the Moms go crazy. Normally when they would watch a show like this, Richie’s gags and terrible accents, with Stan’s quips and talkbacks would result in the both of them laughing themselves into headaches but Stan couldn’t help the knot that was twisting in his throat. 

He was filled with this all encompassing loneliness. Despite Richie’s presence, being without loved ones during grief is perhaps worse than the grief itself. It covered his senses like a second skin and muffled the outside world, the TV was quieter, the chill in the apartment less biting, Richie’s voices hollower, all that Stan could bring into focus was his own thoughts. His feelings and his emotions taking up all of his attention, demanding it, not giving him the choice of simple menial distractions. Stan gave Richie a laugh when appropriate to do so, made comments when seemed right and did it all with a degree of clinical timing that he hadn’t been aware he possessed. He began to spiral, the way one usually does in the shower, festing until they’re sitting on the shower floor. 

The loss of his cat dislodged something and brought it to his attention, when he leaned in closer to the gap, from where a menacing light was shining he noticed this: his life had not been as breezy and consequential as he had built himself to believe. It was all a facade he had curated. He saw his parents in the corner of his mind’s eye. He had forced himself into believing that every decision he had made was easy, painless and without internal warfare. This had successfully laxed the firmness of the grasp in which anxiety had held him but at the expense of the thing which wartime poets claimed made us human: hope. Rather than aim high with eyes shining with hope, Stan learned that he would have a lot less anxieties about stress and failure if he aimed lower, more achievable. So his degree turned from that in biology specialising in ornithology to accounting, he was good with numbers and it was low-risk, medium-reward. It made sense, logically it all checked out, so Stan didn’t worry about his future career past that moment.

What did he have? What did Stanley Uris have? Not corporeal things, like money, clothes, or even friends. Those were attainable through straightforward means. What did Stanley Uris have inside? There was little hope, little aspirations past those of accounting, there was no passion. The only passion he had was his birds, but even that seemed like he was desperately grasping at straws to keep the image of his past-self alive, to convince himself that he hadn’t rewired his entire identity to make his life easier and less chaotic for the sake of himself and his family. Little Stan always liked birds. That much hasn’t changed, the fact that it hasn’t changed is enough of a smokescreen to cover all that has.

Stan is ripped from his spiraling with the loudness of sudden silence. “What’s wrong.” Richie said. 

“Nothing. Why did you turn it off?”

“Stan. You can talk to me. I’m more of a dog person, really but I won’t even mention it.”

“You just did,” Stan pointed out good-naturedly.

“Statement retracted.” Richie propped his thigh with his socked foot. “C’mon, talk to me.”

“I-” Only now has Stan realised the heavy knot in his throat. He tried to speak a little more and found that he couldn’t. Over the next few minutes, Richie coaxes Stan out of it. ‘It’ being his comfort zone, the walls he had blindly built. Stan, eventually, does. When he starts, he finds himself unable to stop and everything that had been on his mind since moving into Bill’s apartment until now came tumbling gracelessly from him like a wheelbarrow of marbles down a jell-o staircase.

After spilling his guts, Stan feels the tears that had built up and fell down his splotched cheeks, but didn’t wipe them. “For all I know, everyone feels like this. Not just now, but all the time, and while I’ve been screaming alone, everyone else has been screaming too, on the inside.” Richie’s thumb rubbed his shoulder. It was a small comfort, but did make him feel a little better and more grounded. 

“Probably. But you’re not screaming alone, you know? I get what you’re saying - but it’s not true. You’re screaming to me, quietly,” Richie says. His voice is light and noncommittal as always, but there is something in his eyes. Something heavy that Stan can’t bring himself to look away from. “And I hear it. I hear you.” Stan bristled with goosepimples.

“You-” Words escaped him. “I shouldn’t be bothering you,” He settled on. Richie smiled softly at that and squeezed his shoulder.

“What else is there to do than be bothered right now? The only alternative is to stand on the fire escape and count passing cars.” Richie took Stan’s hands into his own. “Bother me, Stan,” He said sincerely, “I want to be bothered by you.” 

Stan found himself noticing how much time slowed in that moment. The blood in his veins flowed steadily, his chest breathed in and out, the rain currently pelting the windows did so leisurely, unaware of the universe that had been crafted on the other side of its pane of glass. When he began to lean in, it wasn’t of his own accord, like he had been crafted by a God and had lived his life to carry out this one task, and now, the God has to take the reins for a moment, to make sure it’s done right. 

Richie’s eyes flickered to his mouth and back to his eyes, he was leaning in too. His breath snagged on the wet of Stan’s lips, causing Stan’s breath to catch momentarily. Every nerve on his body was tuned into what was happening, his entire body had rewired itself to feel as much of Richie’s presence as possible. So when the doorbell rang, Stan started. 

“Delivery!” Said a stupid, rotten, snot-nosed voice. 

“Gary.” Stan and Richie said at the same time. Stan, glaring at the door, Richie somewhat dazed. It was Richie who opened the door because Stan, despite having never hit someone in his life, knew that if he saw that teenager, he would pummel him with everything he had. 

The order, despite only having two items, had been wrong. Stan’s beer was safe, thankfully because Stan was sure that he was balancing on the edge of a full-on ugly-cry breakdown and that may have just been enough to push him. Richie’s wine was white instead of red, but Richie said he didn’t mind - he usually was colourblind after two glasses anyway. 

Stan was three beers and and Richie, a bottle. The TV had been turned back on, but it was background noise - some C-list TLC show that neither of them were paying enough attention to for snarky commentary. It was enough to fill the empty silences, to turn his head to when thinking of answers to difficult questions, but not enough for him to actually become distracted from the conversation at hand. 

The tone had since lifted somewhat, their near-kiss was being drowned, in Stan’s mind, with every mouthful of beer. It was an emotional moment, is what he kept telling himself, things like that happen in emotional moments, tensions run high and we fall into our instincts. Stan could tell Richie was trying, and failing, not to think too much about it. Richie was jump when Stan accidentally touched him and his eyes kept falling to his lips then being forcibly wrenched back to look him in the eyes. 

Mid-conversation about Stan’s old waiting job, with only  _ some  _ profanity directed at his old boss, Richie’s phone buzzed. Unlike the other times during the night when his phone buzzed, which surprisingly, was often, Richie tapped out a fairly decent-sized response. He paused every now and again to think then continued. Stan, out of nosiness, asked who it was, with the tone to tease. 

Richie snorted at it. “Yeah, I wish-” He added quickly to that: “It’s Mike.” Then more leisurely: “He’s getting this strange notion that me and you are becoming friends.”

“You and I.” 

“Yeah.”

“No I mean-” He pointed back and forth, “You and I. Not ‘me and you’.”

“Oh fuck off, I  _ know _ . I write for a living, dumbnuts - or did you forget?”

Stan smiled into his beer, “No wonder your articles keep getting rejected when you don’t even know fifth-grade grammar.” 

“And that right there-” Richie shook his phone in front of Stan, where indeed, he had been texting Mike. “is why I said no - we’re not friends, in fact we are having a secondary civil war inside his apartment.”

“What did he say to that?” 

Richie coughed dramatically before reading out, in a deep voice: “‘As long as I don’t see any confederate flags when I come home it’s fair game.’ I said that oh, don’t worry, he won’t  _ see  _ them.” Stan got in a good shot at Richie’s arm. Richie rubbed it and gave him an exaggerated frown. “Well, when he comes home to see me battered black and blue he certainly won’t think we’re friends.” 

“Well he wouldn’t be wrong,” Stan said, taking a nonchalant drink as Richie continues to hiss in pain rubbing his arm.

“Well what would you say we are?” 

Stan thought about it over a mouthful of beer. “I don’t know.” He settled on. Richie looked dissatisfied. Stan was suddenly very aware of their knees touching. “I’m not sure. Relationships are hard to define but I’d say sure, it’s somewhere within the regions of friendship.”

“Somewhere within the strange friends-ish realm,” Richie agrees. “You want a smoke?” Stan shrugs a non-committal ‘sure’ and watches diligently as Richie prepares a pair of cigarettes. Richie had said to him, after requesting Stan to bring him home rolling papers, filters and tobacco on the returns from one of his walks, that he finds the act of rolling them relaxing. He didn’t mind smoking straights, sure, but the act of sitting down and having to make them cut him down and his lungs were thanking him for it. Stan wasn’t sure how true this was considering Richie gets winded walking up the stairs, but he didn’t want to rain on his parade. 

Stan was always surprised at the care of which Richie’s big, bumbling hands were able to make of them. Stan knew the level of gentle dexterity that was required and Richie seemed to meet those needs effortlessly, sometimes without even looking, his eyes glued to his laptop re-reading an article due for submission, while he rolls on his keyboard. Stan decided to speak now, before his thoughts ran away with him.

“Do you ever think about how we all are friends with people differently?”

“Jesus, Stan. You’ve had what - three beers?” Richie laughed. He licked a strip up the paper to stick it closed and he handed this one to Stan. “What do you mean?”

“We use the term ‘friend’ as a blanket term - but it feels so grossly understated. Bill is my friend, but so is Ben, but they’re my friends differently. They’re not my friends as the same way as the other, they can’t be. The older I get the more I seem to realise that you can’t have identical friendships with different people. It just isn’t possible.”

Richie nodded seriously. “I get it. I think.” He finished rolling his cigarette. “What’s the saying… you can love in a million different ways but never the same way twice, or some shit like that. Right?” 

Stan, for reasons out of his control, speechless, simply nodded. He sure was right. 

Stan’s stomach lurched into his mouth when Richie pulled him up by his hand to bring him out to the fire escape for a smoke. Stan found himself inept at normal conversation when he and Richie’s arms were aflush in the cool air, when Richie was standing so unobtainably close. 

\-- 

Richie wakes up some mornings later, despite having a crick in his neck, excited. Not for anything in particular, but he enjoys spending time bumbling around the house. He enjoys the sound of Stan talking with his classes upstairs in a soothing, professional tone, punctuated by loud, furious commentary on how  _ stupid  _ his classmates are, which Richie feels blessed to be able to hear. These sessions are always followed by Stan coming downstairs, completely composed and refusing to acknowledge any of it. ‘Who was shouting? No, that wasn’t me. Must be the neighbours, Richie.’ Richie never admits it, but he finds it beyond hysterical. 

He loves his ritual of bringing Stan his morning coffee, occasionally he plays it up and comes in looking increasingly stupid. That was cut short when Stan almost threw the piping hot coffee back in his face for walking in with his pants down and only one of Mike’s monster books covering his indecency. He moved back into safe territory after that, drawing silly moustaches on his face in eyeliner (he texted Bill as to why there was eyeliner in his medicine cabinet, with only vague replies), wearing his hoodie back-to-front, wearing a paper bag on his head. He used to love how his classmates would react, even though Stan had headphones and he couldn’t  _ hear _ their reaction - he could see how much they’d laugh and how everything was derailed, even for a few seconds. Over time his view shifted from all of those boxes to just one. He’d see how Stan would try not to smile or acknowledge Richie walking in at all, but there was always a small millisecond where his face would rush with delight before falling back to neutral. It was like cocaine. 

Increasingly, it wasn’t only that moment of a smile Richie chased like an addict for his next fix, it was all of them. All of those moments. He loved it when he made Stan laugh, a self-centered trait which was exactly the trait he needed to do comedy professionally. Stan was his favourite type of laugher: those who operate on two settings; off and on. Stan will give a huff of breath or a  _ look _ when he found something funny, or even a small smile if he was feeling particularly generous, but when he found something  _ really  _ fucking funny, it was all rules out the window. Stan would laugh until his face turned red and he couldn’t speak. 

Richie noticed the glaring DANGER DANGER signs when he felt that feeling of joy when Stan laughed at a video he was watching. He was sitting on the arm chair, curled up watching videos on his phone with his headphones in while Richie was pretending to work. Then out of nowhere, he bursts into that amazing laughter that had Richie smiling and at a loss for words. He loved it when Stan laughed, whether or not he was the cause of it. That was the first DANGER sign.

The second sign was when Stan asked him if he wanted to watch Riverdale. It’s very important for to amke this clear: Richie has put weeks worth of food on the table making shitty articles about this batshit show. He has written a disseration’s worth on it and yet he still never has a clue what is going on. He sees tweets, he sees the memes, he even scours the depths of fandom hell to pull up the most popular fan-theories and hot trends to incorporate into his articles to draw in more traffic, and he would feel more aware of those going-ons if he was writing about Ancient Greece. Which he did once, and yes, he did understand less about the happenings within Riverdale. Despite all of this, he said yes.

Richie Tozier sat and willingly watched an entire season of Riverdale with Stan (who apparently hate-watched it, but given his reactions to someone getting… shot? Richie doesn't really believe it) and hated every mind-fucking moment of it. And yet, he did it. He did it because Stan would turn to him every couple of minutes and make a comment about some crackhead character doing crackhead things and he can’t believe such crackhead shenanigans occur on this crackhead show marketed for crackhead teens. 

The third DANGER red flag was when they kissed. In hindsight, Richie probably should have recognized this as a red flag when they almost kissed that one drunk night, but he respectfully pleaded the fifth. 

See, this red flag was ignored for so long because the ignoring of these DANGER signs was mutual. Together, they waltzed over blurred lines of playing footsie and sitting close watching movies and staying up late discussing all sorts of things that takes years to bring up in regular friendship. It was a mutual agreement to, in Richie’s mind, go full hog. 

So, one night, both fairly tipsy on cheap prosecco (which was meant to be gin, thank you, Gary!), they had been talking about things that make them happy. They had both had a rough day, nothing in particular happened but their moods shifted during lockdown. Some days, Richie would wake up exuberant and positive, others he would wake up positively dreading every second he had to be awake on this wretched plain. Stan felt the same, often these days never lined up. On Stan’s down-days, Richie would make him his teas for his headaches and all but put a gun to his head and make him call someone. Talking to someone besides Richie usually did enough to cheer him up for the break in routine, then he would go about his walk and come back more or less happy. On Richie’s down-days, Stan ordered takeout and told him embarrassing stories about their friends, since their wild nights out never overlapped, there was a huge untapped well of Bill trying to climb trees, Eddie stealing shit from bars, Beverly drunk-dying Ben’s hair. Stan had a talent for telling hilarious stories, with professional-level comedic timing and the flattest delivery, and Richie adored it more than he would say. 

This night, their bad-days lined up, which hadn’t happened before. When Stan came downstairs at noon, unwashed, to Richie, still lying bundled in blankets on the couch, watching reruns of Golden Girls, they were struck to silence in this uncharted territory. Richie got up, made them both instant noodles and bought an online delivery. 

So they got drunk, still watching Golden Girls, and said everything that came to mind, which pleasantly, had turned to listing off all the things that made them happy. It was a game of back-and-forth for the best part of an hour. Things that made Richie happy: pizza, Mike, watching videos of babies being knocked over by huge dogs, weird russian music videos, that man who makes knives out of weird shit on youtube, when the fast food worker gives him extra fries for being polite, fast cars, old records, the smell of gasoline, people who get into heated debates in mom forums. Things that make Stan happy: his friends, the treehouse he and Bill used to play in when they were kids, bird watching, 24 hour diners, watching shitty tv-shows, when beverly sends him free clothes from her fancy internship. 

The listed came to its crown when Stan was lying on the couch, trying not to laugh and Richie was sat on the floor, leaning somewhere around where Stan’s chest was. Richie said honestly, “I’m happy.” It was a statement which to him, was huge. He was bullied a lot. He was unhappy in some small but consistent way for all of his life, niggling annoyingly at the soles of his feet like a stubborn flea. He was expecting a lighthearted response but instead he got one which carried the same heaviness of his own.

“I’m happy too.” They sat in silence for a few minutes, basking in the atmosphere they had curated. Suddenly, some minutes later, Stan sat up. “Where are you happy?”

Richie blinked dumbly. “Huh?” 

“Where are you happy?” Stan pressed his hand to Richie’s chest. “I’m happy here.” 

“Inside me?” Richie’s brain caught up to his mouth and he quickly moved from that sentence. “I don’t know. Is this about chakras and shit?”

“No,” Stan said, hand still firm on Richie’s chest. “Everyone feels things in places. When I’m sad it’s here.” His hand shifts to Richie’s clavicle. His finger presses purposefully on the dwell of Richie’s throat and Richie knows that Stan felt how hard he swallowed at that. Stan stares at his finger, then he meets Richie’s gaze with an unreadable look. His eyes flicker to Richie’s lips. 

Richie suddenly finds it quite difficult to breathe normally. Is it two-in-two-out? Is it in through the nose out through the mouth? Is it naturally shallow or deep? Should he feel his nostrils flare? Why did something as basic as breathing become so fucking hard when Stan’s on him like this? 

Stan took a breath. “When I’m angry, it’s here.” He moves his hand to the space where Richie’s neck met his shoulder. His finger which had been resting on his Adam’s apple trailed across his throat slowly to find its new resting spot. Richie knows where Stan holds his anger, he can see it, when he’s mad he scrunches up his shoulders and spends the next two days complaining about shoulder pain. “When I’m nervous about something, I grind my teeth.” Stan trails his hand, his fingers, devilishly slowly from Richie’s shoulder to his jawline. There, Stan traces it at a snail’s pace with his thumb. “Where do you hold it, Richie?” He asked, “Where do you hold your happiness?”

“My dick, probably,” Richie said. 

“Go to hell, Rich,” Stans sad thoughtfully and before he knew it, Stan was meeting him halfway where he was moving forward. Their lips met. They kissed. And they kissed. And they kissed. And they kissed. 

Richie kissed him with the need he had barely only begun to recognise had built up inside him and there too, in the midst of the most confusing and isolating time of his life, Richie recognised that he had fell a little bit in love with Stan… shit, he never did get his last name. 

**Author's Note:**

> this is only half beta'd because when i was reading it over a giant spider spawned on my roof and fell on my laptop like 5 inches from my face and I'm writing this as i commit arson thank you Seattle


End file.
